Stolen - DVD

Film: Time and time again, master thief Will Montgomery (Nicolas Cage) has evaded arrest. But one small mistake ultimately becomes his undoing. While his accomplices Vincent (Josh Lucas), Reginald (M.C. Gainey) and Riley (Malin Akerman) manage to escape, Will falls into the hands of his longtime pursuer Tim Harlend (Danny Huston) and is sent to prison for eight long years. After serving his sentence, Will hopes to start a new life and finally build a relationship with his daughter Alison (Sami Gayle), who has since grown into a teenager. But all his hopes are quickly dashed. First Alison gives him a harsh rebuff and then the girl is also kidnapped by Vincent, who was thought to be dead. The latter not only blames Will for the serious injury, he also believes he cheated him out of the loot. And now he wants his share, or Alison will die. Will can't expect any help from Harlend and his right-hand man Fletcher (Mark Valley), so the ex-con sets out on his own to save his daughter - even if it means committing yet another robbery to get the money...

After action specialist Simon West (Con Air, The Mechanic) recently celebrated success in the cinema with the successful sequel to The Expendables, his latest film Stolen now comes to Germany only as a home cinema premiere. The action in this film is quite impressive. Even if West couldn't be as self-deprecating as in The Expendables 2 and some elements of the solid production - especially the music - seem a bit cheap, Stolen offers more action, suspense and good entertainment than other movies that make it to the cinemas. The visuals are on a high level, if only because of the atmospheric New Orleans location. But even otherwise, the camerawork makes the solid $35 million budget quite apparent.

The actors also deliver decent performances throughout. While Josh Lucas acts a bit over the top, Nicolas Cage in particular is convincing. Cage, who has been playing somewhat bored through various DVD premieres lately, acts with much more verve and gusto here. Even though he is not really asked to do much in terms of acting here, he gets enough out of the rather simplistically drawn character to make the viewer root for Will's desperate attempt to save his daughter.

After offering some really good entertainment, especially in the first third, the tension curve drops a bit towards the end. This is not only due to the fact that the story itself doesn't have any real surprises to offer, but also due to the fact that logic is getting more and more absent from the action. Still, even if Stolen didn't turn out to be the smash hit that one would have wished for in a second collaboration between Cage and West after Con Air, the bottom line is that the film is a good action thriller that fans of Nicolas Cage or of films like Taken can definitely get behind. Worth seeing!

Picture + Sound: The technical quality of the DVD is on a good to very good level. Especially the visual realization is to be seen that Stolen is a film designed for the cinema. The good detail sharpness, the coherent contrasts and balanced black levels leave an overall very good impression. The Dolby Digital 5.1 mix also confirms this impression. While the dialogue on the German soundtrack is mixed a bit very front-heavy and less harmoniously integrated into the action, as is the case with the English soundtrack, the action scenes provide some decent sound effects for pleasant movement in the surround area. Good!

Extras: In addition to just under 30 minutes of promo interviews with the director and lead actors, the DVD has another ten minutes of uncommented B-roll footage to offer, as well as a nearly 5 minute behind-the-scenes look. Real insight into the making of the film offer only the interviews, which, however, as they were conducted for promotional purposes, remain rather superficial.

Conclusion: Stolen is a decent thriller that has a lot of suspense and good action to offer, especially in the first half. Even if the logic finally says goodbye in the last third and the very big surprises are missing, Expendables 2 director Simon West has staged solid popcorn action, which despite its weaknesses guarantees an entertaining home cinema evening. Recommended

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp