'Taken' Director Is Turning Japanese

It's nearly time to take an accounting of the movies from the first half of the year, but without thinking too hard, we can all name some of the biggest hits of 2009: Paul Blart, Monsters vs. Aliens, Fast and Furious, and Taken. Of these, Taken might be the biggest surprise, both because it isn't really star driven and because of its remarkable staying power. And while it might lead to sequels and more projects for Liam Neeson, it's also going to be a big launching pad for director Pierre Morel. A cinematographer for a bunch of years, Taken was Morel's second film as a director, and his third - the hitman flick From Paris With Love - comes out next February. And now he has signed up to direct another thriller, this one set in Tokyo. According to Variety, Paramount has picked up a movie project that sounds...uh...pretty much the damn same as Taken. Here's the pitch: "(The) story follows a CIA operative, stationed in Japan but on the verge of retirement, who is ordered to carry out a final mission. He finds himself caught in the middle of an international conspiracy." Just imagine if that international conspiracy that involved his kidnapped daughter. Then we'd have something. But this really isn't connected to Taken in any way; the project has been in development with screenwriter Frank Baldwin and producer Alli Shearmur for quite a while. But it's certainly convenient that there's a director who just made a very successful version of a similar concept. Kudos to Morel, though. He certainly earned a shot with Taken, which was about as good an action-packed, mindless potboiler as we've seen in a while.

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