96 Hours (2008)

A retired CIA agent travels across Europe and relies on his old skills to save his estranged daughter, who has been kidnapped while on a trip to Paris.

Director:

Pierre Morel

Writers:

Luc Besson, Robert Mark Kamen

Stars:

Liam Neeson, Maggie Grace, Famke Janssen

2 wins & 2 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Liam Neeson	...	Bryan Mills
Maggie Grace	...	Kim
Leland Orser	...	Sam
Jon Gries	...	Casey
David Warshofsky	...	Bernie
Holly Valance	...	Sheerah
Katie Cassidy	...	Amanda
Xander Berkeley	...	Stuart
Olivier Rabourdin	...	Jean-Claude
Gérard Watkins	...	St-Clair
Famke Janssen	...	Lenore
Marc Amyot	...	Pharmacist
Arben Bajraktaraj	...	Marko
Radivoje Bukvic	...	Anton (as Rasha Bukvic)
Mathieu Busson	...	Undercover Agent

Storyline

Seventeen year-old Kim is the pride and joy of her father Bryan Mills. Bryan is a retired agent who left the Central Intelligence Agency to be near Kim in California. Kim lives with her mother Lenore and her wealthy stepfather Stuart. Kim manages to convince her reluctant father to allow her to travel to Paris with her friend Amanda. When the girls arrive in Paris they share a cab with a stranger named Peter, and Amanda lets it slip that they are alone in Paris. Using this information an Albanian gang of human traffickers kidnaps the girls. Kim barely has time to call her father and give him information. Her father gets to speak briefly to one of the kidnappers and he promises to kill the kidnappers if they do not let his daughter go free. The kidnapper wishes him "good luck," so Bryan Mills travels to Paris to search for his daughter and her friend.

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Plot Keywords:

agent | cia | france | rescue | teenage abduction | 

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Taglines:

They have taken his daughter. He will hunt them. He will find them. He will kill them.

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Genres:

Action | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence, disturbing thematic material, sexual content, some drug references and language

Details

Official Sites:

Europa Corp. [France] Official Facebook

Country:

France

Language:

English Arabic French Albanian

Release Date:

30 January 2009 (USA)

Also Known As:

96 Hours

Filming Locations:

Avenue des Champs-Élysées, Paris 8, Paris, France

Box Office

Budget:

$25,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

£1,165,986 (UK) (26 September 2008)

Gross:

$145,000,989 (USA) (3 July 2009)

Company Credits

Production Co:

EuropaCorp, M6 Films, Grive Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

93 min

Sound Mix:

DTS Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The curved knife used in the final fight is a "karambit". It's a filipino weapon and the finger hole in the handle makes it very difficult to disarm, which was evident in the fight scene.

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Goofs

When Amanda was taking a photo, the camera phone was held in the landscape position, but when Peter was taking the photo for them, he held it in the portrait position. Later, when Bryan was reviewing the photos, all the photos were in the landscape position, including the one supposedly taken by Peter.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Singh: Mr. Mills, how are you?
Bryan: I'm fine. How are you?
Singh: Very fine. I suppose you want to see it again?
Bryan: If you don't mind.
Singh: You know where it is.
Bryan: Oh yeah.

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Connections

Spoofed in Who the F#@K Took My Daughter?

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Soundtracks

Change
Performed by Joy Denalane feat. Lupe Fiasco
Written by Curtis Mayfield (as C. Mayfield), Ben Krass (as B. Krass), Joy Denalane (as J. Denalane), Max Herre (as M. Herre), Sekou A. Neblett (as S. Neblett), Lupe Fiasco (as W. Jaco)
(c) Chi-Sound Music (Administered by Warner-Tamerlane Publishing) / BMG UFA Musikverlag GmbH & BMG Songs / Edition Red Black & Green / Edition Soulguerilliero / Heavy as Heaven Music c/o Universal Music Publishing MGB France
Contains sample from "I Want to Go Back" by Curtis Mayfield and Ben Krass
Courtesy of Warner Chappell Music France
(p) 2006 Nesola GmbH
Courtesy of Sony BMG Music Entertainment France

User Reviews

Probably the fastest 93 minutes of my life !

Wow - I had already read reviews of this movie, and with the writer being one of my favourite directors, Luc Besson, I just had to go see this movie as soon as possible...

I was not disappointed... I'm not sure if this was intentional but there were no trailers before the movie, so being thrown strait into the film unexpectedly with people whispering "is this it then ?" only helping build up some initial tension and excitement.

The film starts nicely, but with overtones of spy thrillers like "Day of the Jackal" coming to mind. Neeson seems a bit pityful at the start, but soon overturns that impression with a taste of his handywork after around ten minutes of the thriller.

Then, before you know it, it's over. 93 minutes, gone in a blur of fighting, fear, chasing and excitement at serious pace. The artwork and direction is nicely done, giving you the feeling of being the one attacking and the chair squirming feeling of being the poor gits who get annihilated in almost every way possible.

It was one of those films that I wanted to applause after the film, I actually clapped about three times, but no-one joined in... too afraid of being the only two people clapping I suppose...

Neeson was great, and I can't wait to see the movie many more times. I only gave it 9 out of 10, as it was too short ! The film could have been easily stretched to 2 hours in my opinion, with some more development and intimacy with the characters. But I guess this may have not made it so exciting... still, well worth the money to see this in the big screen.