THE COMMUTER | FAMILY MOVIE REVIEW INFORMATION FOR PARENTS AND KIDS

"THE COMMUTER"
(2017) (Liam Neeson, Vera Farmiga) (PG-13)

QUICK TAKE:: Action/Thriller: A recently fired insurance agent is presented with a lucrative offer -- $100,000 for figuring out who doesn't belong on his daily commuter train and getting his hands on a mystery object in their bag -- that turns out to be good too good to be true, or safe.

PLOT:

Michael MacCauley (LIAM NEESON) is a 60-year-old man who gave up being a cop a decade ago to become a life insurance agent. His life is rather mundane, including taking the commuter train into the city each day for work, and he and his wife, Karen (ELIZABETH McGOVERN), are trying to figure out how to pay for their son's college tuition. Thus, Michael is thrown for a loop when he's fired out of the blue, and after drowning his sorrows with his former cop partner, Alex Murphy (PATRICK WILSON), he boards the train and heads home, trying to figure out how to break this news to Karen.

But that gets interrupted when a stranger, Joanna (VERA FARMIGA), sits down across from him on the train and proposes a compelling offer. She states that someone on the train doesn't belong there and if he figures out who that person is, and can get his hands on a yet-to-be-disclosed item in their bag he'll get $100,000 for his efforts. He doesn't believe this is true, but after finding the $25,000 down payment in one of the bathrooms, he realizes it's real. Even so, and despite taking the money, he has no intention of completing the task for the rest. That is, until Joanna -- who's no longer on the train but communicates with him via phone or intermediaries -- informs him that doing so puts his wife and son at risk.

Accordingly, he tries to figure out who the person is, although he can immediately rule out the likes of his commuter friend, Walt (JONATHAN BANKS), as well as the train's conductors, long-time veteran Sam (COLIN McFARLANE) and his younger counterpart, Jimmy (ADAM NAGAITIS). With time running out before getting to the station where the person -- identified only as "Prynne" -- is supposedly going to disembark, Michael suspiciously eyes the various passengers who range from Eva (CLARA LAGO) and Sofia (ELLA-RAE SMITH) to Jackson (ROLAND MOLLER) and Oliver (KOBNA HOLDBROOK-SMITH) among others who are unaware of what's occurring.

WILL KIDS WANT TO SEE IT?: If they're fans of watching Liam Neeson in everyday man hero mode, they probably will.

WHY THE MPAA RATED IT: PG-13: For some intense action/violence, and language.

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