If Cold Pursuit made one mistake, it was casting Liam Neeson as the vengeful protagonist. Neeson comes with a certain amount of baggage: his resume and his mouth. I have always said that Neeson will not let us love him. Every movie that he promotes is generally accompanied with him spouting a wildly undiplomatic and random opinion unconnected with his film as if he subconsciously is trying to be put out of his career misery or as a dare to prove that nothing can stop the success of his films. He has opined that Manhattan horses are totally fine, #metoo is out of hand and for this film, he unsuccessfully tried to find a black guy, any black guy, to kill because a specific black guy allegedly raped his friend, who is dead now, but yeah. What? I guess when the #metoo comment did not raise enough eyebrows, he decided to go in the other direction as the most fervent, racist #metooadvocate?
Neeson’s movies generally have a sameness to them. Bad guys unwisely mess with his kid de jour, and he goes after them either to rescue or avenge the kid. Cue numerous action sequences filled with gleeful violence. I actually saw the preview for Cold Pursuit in theaters and wrote it off as the typical Neeson flick, which I always see at home once it is available to stream. If I pay to see a Neeson flick, he is a supporting actor like Widows or God forgive me, Men in Black: International. The marketing team relied on capturing the same audience that generally sees a Neeson film, and those fans would not necessarily enjoy this particular film since it is literally off beat and more of an ensemble film with comedic undertones.
Cold Pursuit could have gotten more viewers if it had cast someone like Arnold Schwarzenegger, who can actually be deadpan funny and would believably play a snowplow driver out to get the drug dealers who ruined the reputation of and murdered his only son. Or it could have cast a lesser known person and relied more on promoting the humor of the story to get the right kind of audience so it would do well by word of mouth. The snowplow driver may be a central figure around which the plot revolves around, but it is a film more like a Guy Ritchie film which pays homage to the Quentin Tarantino type narrative to see how disparate elements and memorable characters come together for an explosive denouement without the whole enterprise falling apart.
Just because it was marketed poorly or possibly miscast does not mean that Cold Pursuit is a good movie, just more unpredictable than one usually expects from a Neeson film. It is funny in the way that you say, “That is funny” without actually laughing, not actually splitting your pants with uncontrollable laughter funny, and it could have been, but it never quite lands the punchline. It may be because it is a transplant, a remake of a Norwegian film called In Order of Disappearance. I did not know this fact going into the movie otherwise I would have waited to watch the American remake until I could watch the foreign original first. Both films have the same director, but different writers so I would not be surprised if the translation of different elements of the story lost its original meaning. The disparate, diffused humor never quite blends in a way that makes a satisfying whole.
Cold Pursuit actually could have worked as an action wink at horror classics like Duel and Christine, and the film does consciously equate the vengeful father with his locomotive like snow plow, but it waits too long to delve into the generational conflict, which actually seems to be the meat of the story though it is treated like an afterthought in the narrative. There seems to be a sins of the father visited upon the son theme in the film with an emphasis on European immigrants, now American citizens, perpetuating one of America’s original sins against Native Americans, the original inhabitants of the land. It is a potentially thrilling idea to explore, but a Norwegian director who originally envisioned the conflict between (I am assuming based on the description) Norwegians and Serbians may not be the right person to understand and convey that message, especially since instead of land, the argument is over turf for drug sales. All depicted Native Americans are criminals, but the European immigrants/Americans are ordinary people, cops and criminals. Obviously I defer to Native Americans on whether or not this movie works overall. The idea of returning from mournful exile to your rightful place is completely punctured during the last scene in the film, which suggests that it was less about empathizing with the underdog and more about the punchline. It feels more like hipster racism where racism is used because it is wrong so we know who to root against. Still it makes for better satire than Downsizing.
Cold Pursuit seems more comfortable putting its tongue firmly in cheek when exploring issues of masculinity in vengeance narratives. The villain is more like our image of a hypervigilant yuppie mother who micromanages his child’s diet than anything else. Women on both sides of the criminal divide are pushed to the edges of the story, and if they do occupy a role for longer than a few seconds, it is because they are familiar with the dude narrative and use its force against it like karate. Some opt out altogether. My favorite scene is a shootout in an unlikely location with one of the gun wielding bad guys wears a desert rose suit. Another man’s unsavory, commercial sexual exploits ends up having the tables turn on him. Even Neeson is not spared as his age and fitness turn on the traditional hero. Even if it fails to actually get the laughs that it is clearly aiming for, at least it is clever and meta so I appreciate it.
For a violent film, Cold Pursuit surprisingly limits its graphic nature. A lot of the violence is implied or takes place off screen although there are quite a few bloody fist fights with Neeson, who is built like a brick wall albeit an elderly one, doling out the pain. I was simultaneously a little disappointed and relieved that we never got a prose dump regarding why he was able to remain uncorrupted in a town that was clearly immersed in filth long before he was a fetus. Such prose dumps always makes a movie seem contrived since the characters on screen would not need any explanation because they lived it, but it felt as if we got to see the less interesting story.
I would not recommend Cold Pursuit unless you are into a watered down, less funny, derivative, consciously trying to shock crime comedy version of such hits as Fargo or In Bruges. If you enjoy mindless Neeson action films, probably skip this one because it has more of a plot than his usual schtick. I am annoyed that I have inadvertently assigned myself additional homework and have to watch the original. I am a completist.