Edge of Darkness

Rating: 7.0/10

Genre: Drama

Overall value for money and time: 6.8/10

When the daughter of a homocide detective (Mel Gibson) was murdered right before his eyes, he goes on to investigate her death. Gradually, he uncovers her secret life and is caught up between a greater conspiracy.

A movie plot with great potential for action-packed scenes and thrill rides throughout the movie. The movie Taken had it all, I thought, but when I first saw the thriller for this movie, this movie plot was way better cos' of the "secret" life and the conspiracy. Perhaps that was my greatest mistake I made before watching this movie, my expectations of it was not only too high, but it was steered towards an entirely different direction. I guess what I'm trying to say is, I was disappointed.

However, this movie isn't all too disappointing as long as you don't have a false expectation of what it's meant to be. It's a dialogue dominated movie with action scenes less than the number of fingers you can count on a single hand. *spoilers ahead* The "secret" life of his daughter wasn't her being a terrorist or how bad she was (as was misled in the trailer), for it was just a possibility of what she was. I had initially thought Mel Gibson had to fight off a morality battle but no, all he had to fight off, was... just some bad guys.

Things aren't the way they seem in this movie, it had lots of unexpectedness about it, I wouldn't term them as "twists" as the impact wasn't intended. It's tough to endure a dialogue dominated melodramatic movie like this unlike Up in the Air, another dialogue driven movie but had the accompliment of upbeat soundtracks.

True, it's not a no brainer movie, but perhaps because it takes too much "brain", concentration-type not thought-provoking type that it failed to make it for me. To add salt to my wounds was my false expectations of it. It wasn't a bad movie, just one not to be watched after a hard day's work or when you're feeling on top of the world.