Take Down (2016)

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

An action-packed slog

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

TAKE DOWN is a British B-movie thriller with a hackneyed premise and execution, feeling very much like a film such as WILDERNESS but without the professional sheen. This one was shot on the Isle of Man, where a training boot camp for disaffected youth is attacked by a group of machine gun-touting mercenaries keen on kidnap. Wouldn't you know it, the kids soon put their survival skills to the test and go up against the bad guys in the stunning countryside. Some amusement is evoked by the presence of a number of familiar TV stars playing the adult roles; I spotted seemingly half of HOLBY CITY here alongside actors from BLACK SAILS and SPARTACUS, but none of them have very much to work with, which is a disappointment. The film is also way too long, with little happening in the first hour; it only really kicks off in the last half hour, with some not-bad heroics, but by then it's too little, too late.

I enjoyed this one which was a pleasant surprise, actors were not known to me but they did a great job. Great setting.

I felt the film didn't know what it wanted to be. It's set up to be a heist film, but it spends the majority of the time detailing the experience of these billionaire kids out in the wild and their journey of enlightenment and becoming better people.The film does a good job when it's focused on the kids, but then you're pulled out of the story with snippets of the group planning the heist and it feels disjointed. Suddenly, you remember it's a heist/ransom situation and that's almost disappointing. I could easily watch a film about this group of trust fund babies learning what it's like to be free and to want something more than their previous lives.The dichotomy of the film is its weakness. The two parts would have been great as separate movies. However, it is still very much a watchable film.

Once again I am shocked at the low 5.3 average score for this movie.I'm hoping once people read my review, they will rate this movie appropriately.I gave this one a 9. Why? Because you can't compare apples to oranges. What I mean by that is a movie needs to be rated on the investment/production value as well as entertainment.Let me explain; Let's take Barber Shop 2 as an example (that has a 5.9 average). It has how many top rated actors (how many DON'T you know?) as well as a 20 million budget (which went where exactly?). Yet it was boring, biased, stupid, NOT funny etc...Now take this movie... I didn't recognize any actors, budget was clearly low as it wasn't even disclosed, yet the story line was great, acting was good, the scenery was amazing, and I was pleasantly entertained!If a movie has a high budget with A-list actors and top directors/producers and is terrible, it deserves a low score. But going into a movie that is a B type movie with no name actors (of which the acting was not bad at all) and is made well and is entertaining, it needs to be rated appropriately! So hopefully everyone else who sees this enjoys it as much as I did and rates it accordingly.