Ruhet in Frieden – A Walk Among The Tombstones

Erwarten Sie keinen nächsten Action-Neeson-Film. Die einzige Actionszene gibt es gleich am Anfang. Mit seinem Geist ähnelt er Schumachers 8MM - Acht Millimeter. Er hat aber Angst, in die Dunkelheit zu tauchen und aufs Pedal zu treten. Und aus unbegreiflichen Gründen redet er die Aura der Hauptschufte, die eigentlich todesfinster sein sollte, klein. Das Philosophieren über die Schuld und die Erlösung funktioniert im Film auch nicht besonders – in einer der Szenen am Ende, die dadurch originell ergänzt werden soll, ist es wie ein Schlag ins Gesicht. Neeson ist OK, aber der Beste ist hier Ólaffson, obwohl er eine kleinere Rolle hat (der war übrigens auch in Das erstaunliche Leben des Walter Mitty der Beste). [gesehen in Cinemark 18, Howard Hughes Promenade, LA] (20.09.2014)

Eine klassische Rolle für Liam Neeson. Manchmal gebe ich mir Mühe und rechne nach, wie viele Male er einen zerrissenen Einzelgänger, Alkoholiker und (ehemaligen) Polizisten gespielt hat. Egal, er gefällt mir immer. Dieser Film ist aber recht spezifisch, er hat eine eigenwillige Atmosphäre, und ich würde ihn sogar als modernen Film noir bezeichnen. Trotzdem sehe ich das größte Problem im holprigen Drehbuch, es ist unnötig lang und lässt die richtige Ladung vermissen. Lupenreine drei Sterne, was für Liam wohl zu wenig ist. (27.03.2015)

I do not know how Liam Neeson does it, but since Star Wars ended, he has taken on the role of the toughest and most straightforward guy in the film industry. First it was Taken, then Unknown, followed by The Grey and Non-Stop, until he landed with the character of Matt Scudder at the end of 2014, who is basically the same as in his previous movies, and I don't mind it at all. Sometimes, I too would need to act like Liam does in his movies. His films are a great school for me. Among the headstones, it is not only about one person's character. It is also an absolutely honest crime story that ends exactly where you can imagine according to the title. And it is shot so well that five stars would not be enough. By the way, I am also happy that the great Icelander Ólafur Darri Ólafsson got some space. Although his role was not that big, he fulfilled his purpose one hundred percent... and that definitely counts. (31.12.2014)

Neeson walking for some money. First I have to say that Liam Neeson is one of my favourites, but this film is definitely his weakest. There is literally nothing interesting and certainly nothing that I haven't seen in any other film that happens here. It's cliched and boring at the same time. There is very little action and it is so uninterestingly shot that you hardly even notice it. Fans of slow, boring and uninteresting films built solely on story, which I also found unexceptional here, might be happier. I haven't had as much trouble watching a film to the end as I did here in a long time. (15.10.2014)

Liam Neeson again plays a first-class ass-kicker, but unlike Bill Marks, his character has overcome alcoholism (emphasised here more than in the book) and, unlike Bryan Mills, he makes more room for psychology and diplomacy. For a viewer wanting another furious action spectacle, it may even seem that Oskar Schindler will talk the violent psychopaths to death. Personally, I welcomed the consistency of the hard-boiled stylisation, even though it involves reducing women to the status of passive victims. After brutal sexual crimes have been perpetrated against them, the men can avenge them and, in a certain sense, thus redeem themselves (the motif of redemption is quite forcefully pushed into the foreground in the climax, when we have to listen to all twelve steps of the Alcoholics Anonymous programme). Women’s suffering serves only as a pretext for heroic deeds and the moral purification of flawed men. The only relatively active female character from the book (Scudder’s girlfriend, Elaine) was cut out of the film in the interest of better narrative flow. Of course, classic noir films weren’t any more considerate in their handling of female characters, but wouldn’t it have been enough to emulate the classics only at the style level? With its longer, mostly static shots and claustrophobic compositions together with muted colours and a gloomy soundtrack, that style elicits the need to escape into another, more colourful and kinder world. However, the image of a corrupt society with twisted values is taken to such an extreme that the film’s most appealing scenes are the perverted fantasies of serial killers (we see the first one in the opening credits). Such a film naturally cannot have a happy ending, though the last scene may at first give the impression that it will. However, in the context of the immediately preceding events, which most radically deviate from the book (apparently because of the more active role given to Scudder, whose character is otherwise paradoxically based on the passive acceptance of violence), the “superhero” aspect mainly raises concerns about whether there is a way out of the endless cycle of violence that only inspires more such behaviour. 75% (30.10.2014)