In 1991, John Singleton was nominated for Academy Awards for both Best Director and Best Original Screenplay for his debut feature Boyz n the Hood. Twenty-four at the time, Singleton remains the youngest individual to be nominated for direction. He was the first African-American to receive an Oscar nod in the screenplay category. Not to discount those early landmark achievements, but two decades later Singleton is a director-for-hire. His latest piece of hackwork is Abduction, a box office dud from the fall of 2011 that is now available on Blu-ray. It’s an implausible action movie starring Taylor Lautner and has taken a merciless beating from critics. But the movie is watchable, buoyed by an interesting premise.
Lautner plays Nathan Harper, a very psychologically troubled teenager haunted by violent and disturbing recurring nightmares. Nathan’s psychiatrist, Dr. Bennett (Sigourney Weaver), constantly reassures him that he can conquer the dreams and move beyond them. But Nathan doesn’t feel he fits in at home and seems to sense a connection between his real life and the dreams.
His dad (Jason Isaacs) is intent on teaching him self-defense, to the point where their backyard sparring sessions approach physical abuse. Nathan’s mom (Mario Bello) doesn’t seem too concerned. One day while researching missing children for a school project, Nathan and his platonic friend Karen (Lily Collins, Phil’s daughter) come across a picture on a website that looks startlingly familiar. Upon closer inspection, the photo – posted on a “abducted children” website – turns out to actually be Nathan.
That’s the hook of the story: young man finds out he is not who he thinks he is. His parents are not his parents. And after a few phone calls, Nathan finds himself being pursued by both mysterious Serbian terrorists led by Nikola Kozlow (Michael Nyqvist, better utilized in Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol) and the CIA, led by Agent Frank Burton (Alfred Molina). Nathan doesn’t know whom to trust and quickly finds himself running like a scared fugitive.
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