In The Land Of Saints And Sinners (2023) || Movie Review.

It's been a while since I have seen Liam Neeson on the screen to watch any of his movies. I love his works and he is one of my favorite actors. So when I saw the trailer to this movie I was thrilled, though I still have some of his movies I am yet to see that are on my watchlist. Like, ’Retribution(2023)’, and ’Memory(2022)’. I feel in love with Liam’s work when he acted the role of Jesus Christ in ’Pilgrim's Progress(1978)’. Since then, he has been one of my favorite actors.

Liam has acted in a lot of fantastic films that to actually pick the best will be difficult. That is how talented and passionate he is about his roles. For me, now that he is in his old age era, I think this movie is one of his best works apart from his young age era work.

’In The Land Of Saints And Sinners(2023)’ is an Irish action thriller movie that was set in 1974, Northern Ireland. It was directed by Robert Lorenzo and written by Mark Michael McNally with Terry Loane. It was distributed by Netflix and it starred Liam Neeson, Jack Gleeson, Kerry Condon, Desmond Eastwood, Conor MacNeill, Seamus O'Hara, Valentine Olukoga, Bernadette Carty, Ciarán Hinds and Niamh Cusack.

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In an Irish coastal town of Glencolmcille, a ruthless assassin Finbar Murphy (Liam Neeson) decided to start leaving a clean that was void to killing people so he can have a new identity to his name, but will his past stay buried as he wanted?

Meanwhile, Doineann, an Irish Republican Army (IRA) soldier with her gang on the run after their terrorist acts, came to Finar’s village seeking shelter from their crimes. During their stay, Doineann’s brother assaults a young girl, Moya whose mother gave them shelter by coercion. As Finbar begins on his journey to put his past life behind him as an assassin, he meets Moya. After having a brief friendly chat with her Finar saw bruises on her skin and decided to look into it.

Afterwards, Finar meets a young lad, Kevin Lynch (Jack Gleeson) who is also an assassin like and work for Finar’s manager too. Seeing his young self in this young lad, Finar forms a guardian kind of relationship with him. When Finar finds who has been assaulting Moya, he takes it upon himself to kill him with the aid of Kevin who happens to be at the scene.

Doineann the IRA soldier began to look for her brother and discovered he was nowhere to be found. Fueled by vengeance, she decided to seek out the killer of her brother and all hell broke loose. Will Finar go back to his past life?

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My Review And Rating.

Like I said at the beginning of this post, I think this is one of the best movies of Liam in his old age era. This movie feels different, looks different and has a different plot from the usual plots Liam has done since from ’Taken (2008)’ to last year.

Liam’s film is always about revenge action but this one is different and unique in its own even though it is an action kind of revenge movie. In this movie, Liam is at home, he is different and it gave him a new look for more upcoming roles in the future. This movie also has a 70s theme setting, dark humor, very Irish slangs, amazing supporting character performance, and excellently captured panoramic Irish imagery.

The plot of this movie was well and excellently written. It is interesting, old school, fully packed with vivid descriptions of Irish lifestyle, good dark humor, and decent action scenes. I love how the setting of the plot was done, the themes it explored and also what the plot is based on. It is a plot that is intriguing, decent and also, engaging that it will keep you hooked.

The cast, I must say, are exceptional, especially all the supporting characters. Their performances were all felt strongly throughout the movie. A character in the movie surprised me because his performance was unexpectedly amazing. Though he was silly in some scenes, I enjoyed his performance. Jack Gleeson, Our GOT TV series actor. He was amazing with his role and he wasn't annoying as he was in GOT.

Kerry Condon was an amazing antagonist that was annoying, vengeful, and ruthless. She performed her role absolutely well. Liam also was amazing as usual, but I think for this role he was more relaxed and more comfortable. He is still physically fit which gives him a good outlook generally.

The cinematography was fantastic, the scenery amazing to watch. Imagine seeing all the coastal lands of Ireland, that's how it was for me. The mood was well set in terms of the weather there which prompted the constant smoking of all the actors in the movie. The wardrobe for all the characters was spot on according to the time setting. The cars used were also according to the time frame setting which gave this movie an aesthetics and vintage look.

This movie also did have good music, some were suspenseful, sad, some were old violin music, some were Scottish songs and some were classic British style. Before I forget, the camera work of this movie was outstanding. The camera angle was panoramic which gave this movie wide exhibitions of the gorgeous Ireland scenery.

Rating this movie, I will give it 9 out of 10 stars. It was entertaining, engaging, and suspenseful. I enjoyed how decent it was all through. Though there was lots of profanity, I appreciate that there was no nudity. Would I recommend this movie? Yes of course! It is an interesting movie you check out.