Mel Gibson's back! Blood Father is pretty much a leave your brain at the door type of road/chase movie, but it's Citizen Kane compared to your average franchise adventure flick. I'll settle for Citizen Carrion.
The downside is that a lot of the plotlines are hilariously far-fetched, but the action – and Gibson's dominant performance – should be enough to satisfy the demands of your average multiplex popcorn-muncher.
Gibson plays John, an ex-con out on parole and trying to get his life on an even keel after losing everything except his ability as a tattoo artist. His attempt at creating a stable existence living in a trailer park is shattered when his long-missing teenage daughter Lydia (Erin Moriarty) seeks his help and protection.
She's after accidentally shooting her gangster boyfriend Jonah after he insisted she murder a woman to prove her love for him (men, eh?). So now his gang mates are on her trail and her father seems to be her only hope.
After picking her up in Santa Monica and bringing her back to his for some respite, the gangsters turn up at John's trailer, and although they get out alive, his house is destroyed and they go on the run. That sets up a good hour's worth of chase, find and shoot scenes, including a memorable bullet-fest at a motel where a professional assassin, complete with a face tattoo that prove he's bad-ass, turns up and lays waste to anyone who gets in his way.
Poor John has to go back on his pledge to be clean-living, as he shatters several laws and kills off a fair few folk before the film reaches its inevitable denouement.
A lot of what happens in Blood Father is pretty implausible but there's no denying a good chemistry between Gibson and Moriarty, and the action sequences should satisfy enough of the cineplex audience's blood lust to make it a hit.
John Byrne
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