The 2010 action thriller was directed by Martin Campbell and written by William Monohan and Andrew Bovell. It’s the story of Tom Craven ( Mel Gibson ) a Boston cop investigating his daughter Emma’s ( Bojana Novakovic ) murder.
PLOT:
Emma goes out of town to stay at her widowed Father’s place for a few days. She suffers a sudden panic attack, right before getting gunned down right in front of Mel Gibson. Devastated, Tom out on a revenge-induced mission. To kill whoever it was. Since the attacked nearly shot Tom as well, the police actually allow him to investigate the mission by himself.
By the way; did you know this movie takes place in Boston? Because the movie sure as hell wants to remind you that as much as possible. Tom looks through Emma’s things, finding a pistol belonging to her boyfriend, David ( Shawn Roberts ). So he bangs his door down, breaks his furniture, and tackles David to the ground.
It also turns out, that Emma was working for a company working in the radioactive weapons industry. A company she tried to expose. So, as you probably puzzled together by now, they “took her out”.
So after doing some detective work with an older, grimy British detective dude, Gibson finds himself in the mansion of the company’s CEO. Shooting down everybody in sight, until finally figuring out who did it, and kills him. The End.
CONCLUSSION:
Edge of Darkness started out as an AMAZING film. It was fast-paced, the story was excellent, Mel Gibson’s acting was on point. Everything was amazing about this. It did suffer a common problem many films do; the Middle Section. Oh, to have an amazing start, mediocre middle and then come back with a fantastic ending.
Mind you, this was Gibson’s typical kind of role these days, Grizzled oldish guy, been through a lot, dry sense of humor, and guns. But still, he did a great job. Especially since he hadn’t acted in about five years prior, in part due to directing, in part due to his public incident. Regardless, whatever you’re views on the Australian actor may be, this was a good film, that delivered in several ways. 7.5/10.
-The Screenwriter