When it rains, it pours. For some reason, Hollywood really wants to remind us that Kevin Costner exists. Now I'm not in the camp of people who dislike Costner. I grew up with "The Untouchables", "Robin Hood Prince of Thieves", and "Field of Dreams". There will always be a nostalgia factor to Costner. Costner will never be thought of as a good actor. His movies were good and he was simply in them. The criticism I've often heard is that Costner is simply the same in every movie. His Jim Garrison in "JFK" is just Crash Davis from "Bull Durham" who just got off a time machine. His Postman in "The Postman" was just the same as... never mind. Nobody saw that movie anyway. It can't be said that film-goers missed Costner but his absence was noticeable. Much like movies about asteroids, volcanoes, or the White House being attacked, Hollywood loves to overdo things. Costner was in "Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit", the upcoming "Draft Day", and his most recent film "Three Days to Kill". "Three Days to Kill", as most Costner films go, is not helped nor hindered by his acting. The film is instead hurt by a repetitive plot filled with mediocre action scenes that are interrupted by awkward although not unpleasant comedy. You walk out of "Three Days to Kill" simply shrugging your shoulders, no doubt forgetting the mess you just saw.
Ethan Renner (Kevin Costner) is a Secret Service Agent close to his retirement. His retirement will come from an unexpected sickness that gives him only a few days to live. He decides to spend his days in Paris with his estranged wife Christine (Connie Nielsen) and teenager daughter Zoey (Hailee Steinfeld). Renner's bonding time is interrupted when he runs into agent Vivi Delay (Amber Heard) who offers him an experimental drug that may cure his ailment. All he has to do is hunt and kill terrorists who go by the names The Wolf (Richard Sammel) and The Albino (Tomas Lemarguis). Renner has only a few days to survive his sickness, the terrorists, and his rebellious daughter in order to continue receiving the drug treatments.
For some reason, Costner has an odd gruff voice that sounds like he is doing a half-hearted Columbo impression. There is no reason to believe that Costner is the master agent he is thought to be. He limps through his scenes, can barely run, and doesn't seem to be all that great at his job. Renner comes off more like a detective who is expected every now and then to act like Jason Bourne. The film has Renner get more sick "unexpectedly" whenever there is a big chase scene. A plot device has him getting very sick when his heart rate gets too high. Every time this happened, the audience was audibly annoyed. It is bad when even the casual movie-going public is aware of cheap plot devices. Renner doesn't have a problem when he is near large explosions or in gun fights. Only when he is very close to his main target. It is eye-rolling at best.
"Three Days to Kill" is another hard to follow PG-13 action film. The plot isn't necessarily confusing as much as the editing. In their attempt to side-step the violence limitations of the rating, you end up just trying to keep track of the action instead of enjoying it. People get bloodless shot in extreme close-ups. There are no "pay-off shots". They are just a mess of gunshot sounds and people falling down. Every time we see a villain get taken down without a drop of blood or any real excitement we just kind of view it all. There is no reaction but boredom. Like the original "Taken", also written by Besson, it is a movie that no doubt has all the fun and excitement sitting on a hard drive somewhere waiting for the "Unrated Cut" to get released. By that time, nobody will even remember "Three Days to Kill" as anything more than "One of those 2014 Kevin Costner movies".
The one area that "Three Days to Kill" does well in is that it doesn't necessarily take itself seriously. This isn't a sex-trafficking kidnapping story like "Taken". It is an action film about about a spy taking an experimental mystery drug and fighting people with names like "The Wolf" and "The Albino". Costner brings a bit of charm to scenes where he has to confront of get information from people. These slight laughs are welcome, although when you start to consider that they are essentially torture scenes played for laughs it can be a little troublesome. It was nice to have a few laughs and light-hearted moments in an action movie though It may date Besson as the 1990s action filmmaker he is, but it is a slight bit of fun between the noise and chaos. A sub-plot involving a family of African squatters who have somehow been living in Renner's apartment is also an unexpected and charming diversion from the action.
"Three Days to Kill" won't revitalize Costner's career and it more than likely won't hurt it either. It will just go down as yet another 2014 movie that Costner starred in. There is a entertaining B-movie somewhere in the jumbled mess of sub-plots and magic antidotes. If the film could have been a dramedy about Costner reconnecting with his family and the action scenes were there occasionally, it might have been a much better film. As it is, it is a forgettable film that would have done better to fully accept its ridiculousness.
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