Tag: thriller

Liam Neeson excels in the classic film Non-Stop

What better way to spend my Sunday, readers, than with Liam Neeson? Non-Stop is a 2014 action thriller film directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, co-produced by Joel Silver, and starring Liam Neeson and Julianne Moore. I’m pretty sure I’d seen it before, but got roped into watching it again.

Liam Neeson is perfectly cast as Bill Marks, a flawed, weary air marshal whose personal demons make him both relatable and intriguingly unreliable. His performance grounds the film emotionally, adding depth to what could have been a straightforward action role. Neeson’s restrained intensity makes every decision feel risky, and the script smartly uses his character’s vulnerability to blur the line between hero and suspect. The supporting cast—including Julianne Moore and Michelle Dockery—adds further layers of suspicion, making nearly every passenger feel like a potential threat.

The high-altitude thriller proves how gripping a well-executed, old-school suspense film can still be. Set almost entirely aboard a transatlantic flight, the movie wastes no time pulling the audience into its central mystery: a U.S. air marshal receives anonymous messages threatening to kill a passenger every 20 minutes unless a massive ransom is paid. From that chilling premise, the film delivers relentless tension, clever twists, and a constant sense of paranoia that keeps you guessing right up to the end.

What truly elevates Non-Stop is its pacing and atmosphere. Director Jaume Collet-Serra expertly uses the confined airplane setting to amplify tension, turning everyday objects and casual interactions into sources of dread. The film balances smart plotting with visceral action, offering just enough misdirection to keep viewers engaged without feeling gimmicky. By the time the final revelations land, the payoff feels earned rather than forced.

Overall, Non-Stop is an entertaining, edge-of-your-seat thriller that understands exactly what it wants to be. It’s a sharp, suspenseful ride that showcases Liam Neeson at his best and proves that a single setting, when used creatively, can deliver big thrills.

It gets a score of four stars out of five from me. Keep an eye out for it.

Review of “The Missing Ones” by Patricia Gibney

This was published way back in 2017. It is the author’s debut and also the first in the renowned Lottie Parker series. The author is from the same town as myself. The story is set in Ragmullin, a clever anagram of the real town.

Make no mistake, she is picturing Mullingar at every stage. It made reading the novel quite an intimate experience, immediately recognizing where the different scenes fictionally occurred. The scenes of bitter cold and snow brought my memory back to a particularly harsh few winters from nearly a decade ago.

The central character is Detective Lottie Parker. A deeply flawed hard-nosed detective trying to juggle a demanding job with a complicated family life. Her husband died a few years previous leaving her a single parent.

There are numerous complex relationships like Lottie’s relationship with fellow detective Boyd, with her Sergeant, and then each of her children.

The case she is investigating is a series in a presumably normally quiet Ragmullin. The first occurs at the town’s Cathedral and it all revolves around what happened many years beforehand. What follows is a grotesque and excellently written tale of child abuse, corruption, and murder.

It is beautifully crafted and you’re never quite sure where it will go next or who is responsible for the grizzly killings. The author has stated that she just likes writing but this was excellently planned and thought out.

The scenes of child abuse may be too much for many and for those with a weak disposition, I’d give it a wide berth. But if you’re looking for a good crime thriller, look no further. My rating is five stars out of five.

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Playdate by Alex Dahl

Hello readers, I do hope you are all keeping good in these covid times. I have found a little gem for you all. Edgy, gripping, intense – Playdate by Alex Dahl is a fast paced thriller full of suspense that cleverly switches between the different characters involved, including the child herself. A seven year old called Lucia Blix is snatched while on a play date in a small town in Norway. I would guess that this is the worst nightmare of any young mother. The abduction is masterfully done, leaving little trace. The race begins to find her.

At first, a well known pan European criminal network is thought to be behind it. But the days and months pass without any breakthrough. All the time we’re learning more about what motivated the abductor and the girl’s new life.

There is much to admire about this novel and it is full of good believable twists. Nothing is as it seems and we gradually find out how different events are interwoven.

A feeling of suspense persists throughout the entire novel, there is no let up. As I got towards the end, I couldn’t put it down unsure if a grizzly ending was on the way.

The motto of the story is either you should or shouldn’t trust strangers with your children depending on the desired outcome.

Playdate gets four stars out of five.