Foreigner, The

Released by: Universal Studios Home Entertainment
Released on: January 9, 2018
Director: Martin Campbell
Cast: Jackie Chan, Pierce Brosnan, Michael McElhatton, Liu Tao, Charlie Murphy, Orla Brady, and Katie Leung
Year: 2017
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The Movie:

Now that he has reached the age where performing the hair-raising stunts and death-defying fight scenes he built his legendary career on is even riskier than ever before, action cinema icon Jackie Chan is going to attempt something a little different this time…. ACTING! The world-renowned star of international smash hit films such as Drunken Master, Snake in the Eagle's Shadow, and the Rush Hour series takes a cue from Liam Neeson and goes the “aging badass out for revenge” route for his latest outing, the geopolitical suspense thriller The Foreigner from ace action director Martin Campbell (Casino Royale).

Chan plays Ngoc Minh Quan, a well-off Chinese restauranteur living in London with his teenage daughter Fan (Katie Leung), the only family he has left. When she becomes one of many casualties in a bank bombing attributed to the Irish Republican Army, the despondent Quan goes searching for the culprits. Expecting assistance from the authorities, all he receives are assurances that justice will be served and the terrorists will pay for their actions. Northern Ireland deputy First Minister Liam Hennessy (Pierce Brosnan) is the main government official expressing sympathy to Quan while simultaneously stonewalling his independent investigation.

A former IRA member himself, Hennessy has put down his guns and bombs in the hope that he can make greater progress from a seat of power, but he finds his efforts to contain the situation and hold the fragile peace between England and Ireland together threatened by Quan's personal vendetta, which he attempts to quash by any means necessary. Shockingly, Quan's own dark past as a covert government operative makes him hardly a man to be underestimated on a violent mission of retribution.

Best known for the lighthearted action romps that made major global bank thanks to his lightning-swift fighting moves and unforced comedic personality, Jackie Chan finds himself in bold new territory with his starring role in The Foreigner. Though he has taken stabs at serious acting before, they were usually overwhelmed by the action sequences, but Martin Campbell's film manages to keep the two peacefully cohabiting for most of its running time. It's refreshing to see Chan headlining a feature that doesn't have a clear antagonist, instead miring Quan in a world of gray area political complexities that threatens to make him another casualty in a pointless campaign to hold together a peace accord that was doomed to fail from the beginning.

The screenplay by David Marconi (Enemy of the State), based on Stephen Leather's 1992 novel The Chinaman (a derogatory term Quan is referred to by several characters in the story), is at its best when the focus remains on Quan and his search for the people responsible for his daughter's death and provides Chan with a two-dimensional role he proves capable of fleshing out as much as the film requires. Flashbacks and expository dialogue carefully unravel Quan's background without bringing the story to a halt, revealing him to be a man forged by decades of tragedy, death, war, and the requisite past employment in kicking ass that most action heroes require. In his best dramatic performance to date, Chan infuses the archetypal character with sadness, vulnerability, and a simmering fury that he keeps buried and channels into his lethally efficient combat techniques.

When Marconi's script starts to pile on supporting players, shifting loyalties, and clandestine activities that it can't even keep track of (and neither can we) it falters, and the pacing of The Foreigner suffers as a result. Rather than pruning the script of such bloat and concentrating on Quan's arc, Campbell fruitlessly tries to juggle each of the story's working components and give equal weight to both our hero's mission and the John le Carre-lite machinations of Liam Hennessy, yet another in a long history of ambitions politicians who thought they could dance with the devil and get to lead. Pierce Brosnan does typically excellent work as the overwhelmed government official desperately trying to clean up a mess he helped make, but so much screen time is given over to his subplot that it detracts from Quan's story and you begin to wonder if this is Brosnan's movie, or Chan's.

Don't worry though, loyal followers of Jackie, because this tense potboiler has plenty of memorable set-pieces that prove when it comes to dizzying Kung fu combat and seamlessly astounding in-camera stunt work, Chan's the man. The fight sequences are swift, brutal, and often messy, and Chan perfectly utilizes his age and slower reflexes to his advantage when he's pitted against younger, less capable opponents. Campbell makes sure to provide moments for us to observe Quan as an ordinary man with certain skills that make him dangerous, and not a soulless killing machine. He gets hurt, he must repair his wounds, and he shows pain with conviction. It gives the character a stoic humanity that Chan nails with relative ease. In taking on a complete departure from the roles that made him a global movie star, Jackie finds himself back in top form. The rest of The Foreigner is merely okay.

Video/Audio/Extras:

Universal Studios Home Entertainment unleashes The Foreigner on Blu-ray with an excellent 1080p high-definition transfer presented in the 2.40:1 widescreen aspect ratio and encoded in MPEG-4 AVC video. Video quality doesn't astound, but the digitally-shot feature looks as good as it possibly could be. Director Campbell and cinematographer David Tattersall (Speed Racer) bathe the picture in a color palette of steely blues and grays that bring out dimension and texture in the realistic production design work by former Ridley Scott art director Alex Cameron. The crisp image benefits from strong stability and makes the action look smooth and flawless in motion.

Backing up the solid transfer is a lossless English DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 track that offers dynamic range and spacious organization for a truly enjoyable listening experience. Though action is kept to a minimum until the third act, the audio livens up the fights and explosions with superb clarity and depth, while the many dialogue scenes come through perfectly audible and ambient effects are granted enough volume in the background to add to the overall mix. English, Spanish, and simplified Mandarin subtitles have also been provided.

Extra features are quite slim. “The Making of The Foreigner” (2 minutes) is a short, basic behind-the-scenes featurette that overdoes it on interview sound bites and film clips. Much more substantial are the individual interviews with director Campbell (7 minutes) and stars Chan (10 minutes) and Brosnan (11 minutes). Two theatrical trailers (4 minutes total) conclude things on the extras end. A DVD copy is also included.

The Final Word:

Outside of stellar lead performances from Jackie Chan and Pierce Brosnan and some top-notch action sequences, The Foreigner is a professional but forgettable revenge thriller that often lacks focus and can't get out of the way of its own outsized ambitions. It will doubtlessly provide you with an evening of harmless genre entertainment and little else, and Universal's Blu-ray release is the best way to enjoy it.

Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!