Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) is not the kind of parent that most of us hope to be. He's been absent for most of the major moments of his daughter Kim's (Maggie Grace) childhood and adolescence, and he's alienated his ex-wife (Famke Jannsen) to the point where you wonder how they ever stayed married long enough to have a child. But when Kim gets kidnapped in Paris, then we understand what kind of "preventing" that Mills did for the government, and he issues one of the coolest monologues in recent film history: "I don't know who you are. I don't know what you want. If you are looking for ransom, I can tell you I don't have money; but what I do have are a very particular set of skills: skills that I have acquired over a very long career, skills that make me a nightmare for people like you."

What follows is a mash-up of the Bourne trilogy, Ransom and Without A Trace: the International Version; I'd say it's a more fast-paced, action-packed version of Trade, but I don't think anyone else saw that! While the action runs fast from the first third through until the final pulse-pounding minutes, the camera's lens is most focused on Neeson's face, as the contorted, angry, and often fearful father who longs to rescue his daughter from the mess that she has fallen into. In a world facing failing economic times and threats of terrorism, Taken fights back, in a cathartic, anti-Shack sort of way.

Neeson's Mills is not at all like Christ, but he is a Christ-figure. He plunges into the world of sex trafficking, disrupting the flow, and slaughtering everyone who had anything to do with the kidnapping of Kim. He's a one-man force to be reckoned with, and not at all like the kind of peace-loving, joy-promoting Jesus. But he's the one man who has the power to change what is going on, and the one man with the skills, power and opportunity to save Kim from the world of hurt that she's experiencing. Mills becomes savior, protector, and saint to Kim, and the one who can redeem her (and himself) from evil. He challenges the system, and holds accountable those who commit sin, both of omission and commission. The guilty pay in Taken.

But the movie leaves unanswered one question for me that began early on: what about the other girls? While this isn't the sort of movie that most action films are, because it has a political/social awareness agenda, it's main point leaves it open to my question. What happens to the thousands or millions of people who are kidnapped every year who don't have someone like Mills to save them? What can we do, those of us without the particular skill set, to help stop the trafficking of innocent people around the world? I don't know the answer, but it's a question worth asking.

In the end, Mills comes through, just like he said he would, and those who are guilty pay the price. This is a forgiveness-free film, lacking the grace that Jesus provides, but shining the light of redemption on broken relationships and redeeming lost souls in the process.