'The Commuter' REVIEW: Liam Neeson teams up once again with director Jaume Collet-Serra to b

'The Commuter' is directed by Jaume Collet-Serra who has directed several other films starring Liam Neeson such as Unknown (2011), Non-Stop (2014) and Run All Night (2015) as well as other films like The Shallows (2016) starring Blake Lively. I've seen every one of those films except Run All Night. As for the film I have seen, I've enjoyed all of them. They're not great, but they are well acted and well directed enough to be enjoyable popcorn flicks, even though they don't make sense plot-wise in retrospect especially with the Liam Neeson films. The trailers for this film made it look like Non-Stop, but instead of the setting being a plane it's a commuter train this time. After leaving the theater I'd say that this film is about as good as the previously mentioned films.

Liam Neeson stars as Michael McCauley, an ex-NYPD officer who is now an insurance salesman. On one evening as he takes his usual commuter train home he is approached by Joanna (played by Vera Farmiga) and offers him $100,000 if he identifies a hidden passenger on his train before the last stop. The clock is ticking and Michael has to find the passenger or else there would be dire consequences to his family as well as other passengers on the train.

Once again with Liam Neeson action films directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, Liam Neeson is the bright spot of the film. It's the same kind of performance that he did in Taken (2008) as well as the previous films mentioned, but he's just damn good at it. He's rough without ever coming off as unlikable. His character always knows what to do and how to do it. Good job Liam! Once again Jaume Collet-Serra makes this film light, but exciting and suspenseful enough to keep my eyes glued to the screen for most of the film. The film is paced really well and it's not a predictable as I expected.

The grips that I have with the film is that I found the editing at the beginning of the film jarring and constantly took me out of the film. I understood that the deliberate editing was supposed to chronicle Michael's normal everyday life, but it doesn't change the fact that it was so off-putting and did mess around with the pacing initially. While I thought the action in the film was mostly well done, there are some moments of obvious green-screen effects which didn't look really good and also did take me out of the film. And once again with these Liam Neeson action flicks, the third act exposition dump leaves a question mark in your head thinking what you just watched.

Overall, it another one of these movies. It's solidly entertaining and well made, but suspending your belief is required. Liam Neeson does a great job once again doing whatever he does extremely well. The film's bigger picture regarding a conspiracy doesn't a whole lot of sense, but the film does well in keeping us in the eyes of Liam Neeson's character. Being confused when he's confused and learning as he's learning along the way.

'The Commuter' gets a B