Point Blank

Fred Cavayé’s follow up to Anything For Her is another short sharp thriller that stretches credibility to breaking point, but is still entertaining enough to get the benefit of the doubt. However, if you’ve seen Anything For Her then you will suffer from a serious case of déjà vu as that film’s DNA is all over Point Blank. Gilles Lellouche takes the lead role here as a nurse who finds his pregnant wife kidnapped and then threatened unless Lellouche breaks out an under guard criminal from the hospital in which he works. Before long Lellouche is trying to rescue his wife from the bad guys, which consist of cops and robbers. In fact there’s so many bent policemen here that the film could be a sequel to Olivier Marchal’s 36 Quai des Orfèvres. The real similarity’s are with Anything For Her though, from the opening scene of an injured character, to the theme of a man doing anything to rescue his wife. Though the meat on the bones of the Point Blank skeleton are much more of the action variety. Cavayé’s direction is swift and though the screenplay is by the numbers in a lot of areas there are a number of scenes, particularly involving Lellouche’s heavily pregnant wife, that drip with real menace. On the down side any twists are telegraphed pretty much in advance. However, enjoy the good stuff, and throw in a clever scene at the climax set in a police station and you have another entry into the respectable harsh French thrillers of the last ten years

The OC Film Sting Final Verdict

Enjoyable, if implausible, thrills. Rating: 7/10.