Cold Pursuit Movie Review

Cold Pursuit (2019)

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Written by: Frank Baldwin (screenplay by), Kim Fupz Aakeson (based on the movie 'Kraftidioten' written by)
Directed by: Hans Petter Moland
Starring: Liam Neeson, Laura Dern, Micheál Richardson
Rated: R
Watch the trailer

Plot
A grieving snowplow driver seeks out revenge against the drug dealers who killed his son.

Verdict
It's Taken in the snow. Liam Neeson is a snow plow driver that goes on a murder spree for revenge. The movie is oddly comedic at times, but never fully embraces dark comedy. Leaning into that more definitely would have helped. What we get is an mismatch of genre and tone. Neeson has done many revenge movies, and this one ranks in the lower half.
Skip it.

Review
This is based on the 2014 Norwegian film In Order of Disappearance.

Neeson feels like he has his own revenge sub genre, originated by Taken. There's Taken on a train, The Commuter (read my review), Run All Night, many others that include the Taken franchise. None have surpassed Taken.

Neeson plays Nels, a snow plow driver who is citizen of the year. When his son is mistaken for someone else and killed, Nels decided to take revenge. Nels is a killing machine, not even flinching. It just seemed like a leap for someone who is a family man plow driver. Every time a character dies, or is killed, a death card appears on screen with the character's name. It's a neat touch that aids pacing, but I wasn't sure if it was supposed to be comedic or not.

The villain, Viking, is a drug dealer that is nothing more than a caricature. The movie makes sure we won't like him, making Viking incredibly flat. Viking leans so hard into villain tropes it's almost comedic, but not quite.

It's Mr. Plow! If only Nels had a catchy jingle.

I was never sure what tone this is after. The final scene is one of the most awkwardly comedic, but the entirety of the movie up to this point was never quite this silly.
With the body count generated, I'd think the local cops would be more concerned.

I doubt Nels will win citizen of the year again.

This has a few strangely comedic parts that don't seem to fit. If the movie tried for more dark comedy where characters are haphazardly or accidentally killed, that would help set this movie apart. It's easy to mock Neeson's other revenge movie or pseudo spoof them. The main character's name alone, Nels Coxman is a joke in of itself. Viking definitely could have done more with that.

The answer to everything in this movie seems to be murder. That's fine, but the movie never quite settles on standard action revenge more or revenge dark comedy.