Cold Pursuit Review

February 7, 2019 at 4:43am
By Jason Stettner

Cold Pursuit is a rather straight forward film and it just invites you along for the ride. It follows Nels (Liam Neeson), a snowplow driver that seeks revenge against the drug dealers he believes killed his son. This man slowly builds to a high level of aggression after initially getting over the loss that has directly altered his world. This man was once a peaceful, and well loved citizen of the town.

It's these crazy events that send the aged action hero to battle, with an element of that age showing which was great. There were some creative elements as we saw this man eliminate people along the way as he somehow tracked and made his way up the chain. They had some neat little joke type moments throughout and death tags across the screen which were neat. There's also not just a core drug group involved here, some slight mix-ups include another local group. This then becomes a large scale conflict as multiple perspectives clash throughout.

The action and combative segments were slower here, but this helped to deliver more of an impact throughout. You could see that this was an older man fueled by a sense of rage and search for justice. He used creativity in dealing with people and the mighty machines at his disposal. Some rather creative uses, that's for sure.

I also liked the following of the various parties involved. Added context to the dynamics at play instead of having faceless organizations taking each other on. The relaxed town was also great, shot beautifully throughout. This really added a sense of small town life gone big with various forces clashing at various points. This is a very straight forward experience as I had mentioned so you should know what type of action film this is going into it.

The Conclusion

Cold Pursuit delivers impactful action as the aging Liam Neeson continues to delight within this film genre. He was great here, as a simple snowplow driver that wasn't too pleased with what happened to his son. They brought some creative kills, in realistic combative segments with generally slower attacks and just wacky situations.

There were some humorous parts to this and I'm sure many will get a kick out of the vehicle usage. It gets to the point, paces itself well and gives something steady from the action genre. The acting was fine throughout, you get to see the perspectives and it delivers on what you're expecting. It was also well shot, beautiful backdrop of a town for this and it worked out in this snowy tale of sweet revenge.

Cold Pursuit Review at Home with Streamed Viewing
Screening Provided by Elevation Pictures

Rating Overall: 7.0