Travolta is on top form!

New post up for the film From Paris with Love, an excellent film which sees Travolta back on top form.

Living in Paris is James Reece, he works as the personal aide to the US Ambassador. He also takes on small jobs for the CIA and one day hopes to become a full time agent. He lives with his girlfriend Caroline and is quite happy with his life, that is until he gets a call from his CIA boss about a new job. James has to go and meet his new partner who he has to help with a case.

James arrives at the airport to meet Charlie Wax, he is a trigger happy agent who spares no feelings and is more than happy to leave a trail of destruction wherever he goes. The pair do not hit it off straight away and James does not like the way Wax works.

The pair start on their mission but James soon discovers this line of work is not as good and fashionable as he imagined it to be. Can James get to thinking like wax and pull his socks up to help solve the case or will he go back to being the boring aide to the US Ambassador and forget his dreams?

I have wanted to see this film for some time now despite the fact it has had very mixed reviews and I am so please I finally got the DVD as both me and hubby loved it. The storyline was great , not very original but still very enjoyable and the acting just added to the pleasurable viewing experience.

The lead role of Wax was played by John Travolta, he was an excellent choice for this part. He look tough but still had an element of cheekiness about him which helped when he delivered the one liners and I loved how he was so carefree. He worked well with the weapons and looked at ease with them all and he managed to deliver all of his lines with authority and ease. He worked very well with Jonathan Rhys Meyers who played the role of James and I think this because they were so different. The role of James was a much softer one and he was less crazy. He was down to Earth yet he still got shocked by some of the stunts Wax pulled, there was a naivety to his character and I did enjoy seeing how he played to this.

We did get a lot of great support actors in the film and the stand out ones for me were that of Caroline, played by Kasia Smutnaik, and Ambassador Bennigton, played by Richard Durden. they were quite central roles in the story and I think they were both very good and strong roles and the actors did the characters justice.

There was a lot of action in this film and it was all to a very high standard, the scenes with the gun fights were very detailed and all of the actors looked at ease with the weapons and as if they genuinely knew how to use them. They fought well and made the punches look real and not staged. There was also a lot of special effects and explosions in the film and again they were all of a high standard and blended very well into the film. I enjoyed the driving scenes as there was no noticeable added backdrops. I am happy to give a lot of credit to the creators of the special effects as they did a superb job on this film. The props, sets and costumes were also very good and I did enjoy the fact that this was not set in America. We had some very nice shots around Paris and it was nice to be able to see another side to the city and not just the usual tourist places. The clothes were all modern so not much effort was needed in this area.

This is an action film but the role of Wax managed to bring a few moments of fun to it, he came out with a couple of very funny one liners and I think the crazy side of his character gave this film a lighter feel at times. This for me worked very well as it took a little away from the seriousness and made it more enjoyable and easy to watch. There was a good comedy timing from Wax when on screen with James and I think they made a good partnership.

The DVD which we have does not have any bonus feature but this is no great loss for me as I am not a fan of them anyway. The DVD is available for £5 in most stores and also on Amazon. I think this is a very fair price. The running time of the film is 89 minutes and I found this to be a great length with the story moving at a steady pace from start to finish. The rate is a 15 and I agree with this as there is a lot of violence and bad language and we do get to see drug use.

I am more than happy to give this film 5 stars as I loved it. The story and acting were excellent and the twist towards the end was not expected, hubby thought he had worked it all out but he was so wrong! This is definitely a film getting Travolta back on top form and one which is worth the price tag and the time spent watching.