Paul Maguire used to be a dangerous criminal but he has been going straight for many years... then one day his daughter is kidnapped. Either those who did it have no idea who they are messing with or his past is coming back to haunt him. Fearing the latter he gets together with a couple of friends from the old days and starts asking questions. Then her body is found with a bullet from a Soviet Tokarev pistol in her head. He had crossed paths with members of the Russian Mafia before but this time he is going to war. The body count rapidly rises but nobody will admit to knowing anything about his daughter's death.
It must be admitted that this film has some obvious flaws; most notably certain details about the weapon which when revealed make one wonder why nobody thought about it earlier... it is impossible to go into too much detail about this as that would spoil the film. There is plenty of action, some of it is fairly brutal, often meted out by the 'good guys'. This action is pretty exciting and should satisfy fans of the genre. Nicolas Cage is pretty solid as Maguire even if he does get a little over the top when he confronts those he feels are responsible for his daughter's death. The rest of the cast were pretty good although I was somewhat surprised to see Danny Glover playing a police officer... wasn't he 'too old for this stuff' back in the 1980s?! Overall I'd say this is fun if you can overlook certain details.
It must be admitted that this film has some obvious flaws; most notably certain details about the weapon which when revealed make one wonder why nobody thought about it earlier... it is impossible to go into too much detail about this as that would spoil the film. There is plenty of action, some of it is fairly brutal, often meted out by the 'good guys'. This action is pretty exciting and should satisfy fans of the genre. Nicolas Cage is pretty solid as Maguire even if he does get a little over the top when he confronts those he feels are responsible for his daughter's death. The rest of the cast were pretty good although I was somewhat surprised to see Danny Glover playing a police officer... wasn't he 'too old for this stuff' back in the 1980s?! Overall I'd say this is fun if you can overlook certain details.