Bastille Day (2016)

A young pickpocket and an unruly CIA agent team up on an anti-terrorist mission in France.

Director:

James Watkins

Writers:

Andrew Baldwin, James Watkins

Stars:

Idris Elba, Richard Madden, Charlotte Le Bon

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Idris Elba	...	Sean Briar
Richard Madden	...	Michael Mason
Charlotte Le Bon	...	Zoe
Kelly Reilly	...	Karen Dacre
José Garcia	...	Victor Gamieux
Thierry Godard	...	Rafi Bertrand
Vincent Londez	...	Yannick Bertrand
Arieh Worthalter	...	Jean
Mohamed Makhtoumi	...	Christophe
Théo Costa-Marini	...	Xavier (as Théo Costa Marini)
Jérôme Gaspard	...	Yves
Ismaël Sy Savané	...	Serge (as Ismael Sy Savane)
James Stewart	...	Henri
James Cox	...	Pierre
James Harris	...	Marcel

Storyline

Michael Mason, a pickpocket living in Paris, steals a bag with a teddy bear in it. Not realizing the toy contains a timed bomb, he tosses it aside on a busy street. A few seconds later it explodes, killing four people. CCTV footage reveals Mason's face and the French police tag him as a terrorist threat. The explosion, although botched, was set up by a select group of the French Interior Ministry as a decoy so they can make a half billion dollar digital transfer from a bank (closed on French National Day) -- hence the title Bastille Day. In a separate CIA investigation the unruly agent Sean Briar discovers the real story behind Mason's "terrorist attack". The two men, on different sides of the law, collaborate to bring the corrupt members of the Ministry down.

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Plot Keywords:

pickpocket | cia | bomb | swat team | riot | 

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Taglines:

With law comes disorder.

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Genres:

Action | Crime | Drama | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for violence, language and some nudity

Details

Official Sites:

Official Facebook Official site

Country:

UK France USA Luxembourg

Language:

English French

Release Date:

18 November 2016 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Take

Filming Locations:

Paris, Île-de-France, France

Box Office

Budget:

$20,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$39,000, 18 November 2016, Limited Release

Gross USA:

$39,000, 18 November 2016

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$14,397,593, 20 November 2016

Company Credits

Production Co:

StudioCanal, Anton Capital Entertainment (ACE), Amazon Prime Video

Technical Specs

Runtime:

92 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Atmos

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.39 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Director James Watkins said of the movie's opening rooftop chase sequence: "We wanted to showcase Paris in this scene, but also introduce our two heroes and have a sense of the world in which they're in. It's early on in the film, so we're not sure who we're supposed to be rooting for and the points of view shift. Do we want Michael to get away? Do we want Briar to catch Michael? That's the whole nature of their journey together, this constant push-pull and the sense of their being opposed to finding some commonality. In terms of the shooting the rooftop chase, I wanted it to have a real pace and reality to it, so we built rooftop upon rooftop in Paris. I didn't want to do it through visual effects, so the backdrop that you see is a real backdrop of the city of Paris. We went back to really old-school traditions of Harold Lloyd and saying okay, how can we cheat this. I wanted to get that sense of pace on the rooftop so it was important to create a set the actors could really run along. And I wanted the vertiginous sense of the danger, a sense of 'Wow, this is one hell of a drop!'." Not only is the chase scene an exhilarating piece of action, but it's also a pivotal moment in the characters emotional narrative."

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Goofs

After Briar and Mason enter the apartment elevator when tracking down Zoe, there is a hand print on the elevator's stainless steel door. It disappears before they get to their floor.

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Quotes

Karen Dacre: You owe me.
[is suddenly assassinated]

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Connections

Referenced in The Graham Norton Show: Dame Joan Collins/Richard Madden/Lily James/Paul Hollywood/DNCE (2016)

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Soundtracks

Weapon
Written by Dan Smith, Raykeea Wilson (aka Angel Haze), Mark Crew, Dan Priddy
Performed by Bastille, Angel Haze, 'F*U*G*Z', Braque
(p) Virgin Records Ltd
© WWKD / Angel Haze LTD
Courtesy of Universal Music Vision

User Reviews

A solid action thriller with no real political baggage! Enjoy

This film (unfortunately) is most famous because it was set to come out at the same time as a Islamic terrorist attack in France, and one of the reasons I waited a while to watch this film was because I was wary of how Muslims would be portrayed in it etc. Let me without spoilers tell you this film is almost entirely unpolitical, with the 'Islamic threat' so far down the radar it can't even be said to be a theme.

Now on to the film! Do you like Idris Elba? If you don't, stop reading this review and never watch this film. This is his film. He plays a bad-ass CIA agent (there is an irony of a British actor playing a CIA man stationed in France) who does not like to follow rules, and he is on the trail of a master pick pocket (Richard Madden) who gets wrapped up in a plot to blow up France. Cliché, yes, but the film does avoid some obvious ones, surprising pleasantly at some points.

Elba is menacing, cool and always fantastic, and all of his co-stars pull their weight, but none are particularly likable, and they just have very little chemistry together. But, this is an action, thriller, so who really cares about that. The action is solid, but not mind blowing. The balance between action and thriller is about right, and the director does not get distracted with too many side characters or plots.

This is about as standard a movie as you can get, with the only real plus being Elba. He needs to do more action movies, he needs to be the next Bond. 6.5, but IMDb won't let me give it that score so I bump to a 7 on Elba's performance!