Starring Mel Gibson, Rene Russo, Gary Sinise, Delroy Lindo, Brawley Nolte, Lili Taylor, Liev Schreiber, Donnie Wahlberg, Evan Handler
Written By:
Directed By: Ron Howard
Studio: Touchstone
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I remembering seeing this on cable a few years back and liking it. The movie is intense, suspenseful and the acting is great! Perfect ingredients for a good drama thriller.

Ransom is about Tom Mullen (Mel Gibson), who’s a wealthy executive for an airline he built from the ground up. Tom and his wife (Rene Russo) soon find out that their only son gets abducted in the park and is being held for ransom by a group of criminals. Even though Tom is told not to get the Police/FBI involved, he calls them anyway and tries to go about this ransom situation through their way. He eventually takes matters into his own hands and turns the tables on the kidnappers in order of getting his son back.

I love how the movie has it’s twist and turns and you don’t expect certain things. Though it does wear off after seeing it the second time though. You know who everyone is (or what side they are on) and stuff like that but the movie is still very enjoyable to watch. I’d honestly don’t know what I would do if this ever happened to me. I’d probably go out and rob banks if I didn’t have the money. I think in real life, if someone like Tom Mullen pulled off what he did with the kidnappers, the kid would have been dead instantly. I thought the bounty on the kidnappers was a nice touch but I don’t think it would have worked in a real life situation. The movie has it’s fair share of action or suspense mixed in with drama. I love the scenes where Tom Mullen tries to get his son back and has to run through the hoops the kidnappers give him. If I was going through that, I’d be all confused and not knowing what to do because I need someone to repeat something to me twice haha. Plus I’d not be all there because of all the stress of trying to get my son back.

I really liked how the movie was shot. The cinematography was great, and you find out from Ron Howard that the person who did it tragically passed away last year. I liked how it was edited together and showed both sides. It blended very nicely and made the story flow. A good example of this is when Tom Mullen yells at the kidnappers and tells them to fuck off basically. It shows every character involved on both sides and just works really well. I’ve liked the majority of Ron Howard’s movies like Cocoon, Splash, Nightshift, Apollo 13 and of course Willow. this one is also included among those films that I like from Howard. It’s sort of different than what’s he’s normally done and I like that.

There’s some extras on this Special Edition DVD that are worthwhile. First thing in the special features section is deleted scenes. There’s about 5 of them and some are extensive scenes and some are just deleted sequences. Most of the scenes include Hawkins in some form or another. They weren’t all that special really. “What Would You Do?” is a featurette that has interviews with the cast like Mel Gibson, Rene Russo, Gary Sinise, Liev Schreiber and along with director Ron Howard. Plus there’s footage from the movie and behind the scenes. That was pretty good but ultimately I felt it was too short. Ron Howard talked about how he almost lost his Daughter in Quebec once and it was the worst 10 minutes of his life and felt how these characters were going through. It’s every parents’ nightmare to have something like this happen to the family. There’s full length audio commentary with him as well and I put that track on here and there. It seemed informative but I wanted to watch the movie straight up so I didn’t listen to all of it. I liked the featurette “Between Takes” because it showed the cast (mostly Rene Russo and Mel) goofing off and doing jokes and impressions in between takes. So it’s sort of like a gag reel. I like watching that sort of thing.

I felt the movie was exciting to watch and kept me on the edge of my seat. People that like that sort of thing will want to go out and buy Ransom if they haven’t already. I’m glad I checked this movie out again. All star cast, interesting story, top notch director…What more can you ask for?

Features:
– Extensive Deleted Scenes
– “What Would You Do?”
– Featurette with Cast and Crew
– Commentary with Director Ron Howard
– Captivating Behind-the-Scenes Special with Cast and Filmmakers
– International Theatrical Trailer

Audio:
ENGLISH: Dolby Digital 5.1
FRENCH: Dolby Digital Stereo

Video:
Widescreen 1.85:1 Color

Subtitles:

Favorite Scenes: the last 20 minutes were great
Rating: Rated R
Running Time: 0 minutes
Extras Rating:
Overall Rating: