When done with moderate mastery, action movies are pure cinema. They are kinetic, ecstatic and occasionally balletic. Whether we're watching hand-to-hand fights, gunfights or tire-squealing car chases, action cinema has the potential to leave us gasping and cheering as stuntmen (or combat-trained actors) strut their fearless stuff. And if the director is skilled enough to inventively craft a story, shot after chaotic shot, the chaos that unfolds on screen, your reward is nothing short of bliss.

While the action films of a maestro like John WooJackie Chan and Walter Hill make life worth living, the true movie junkie can get their daily fix from a down and dirty formula press loaded with crudely executed punch lines and twisted metal set pieces. There is nobility in this kind of filmmaking. In her vital essay “Garbage, Art and the Movies,” legendary film critic Pauline Kael wrote, “The lowest action trash is preferable to wholesome family entertainment. When you clean them, when you make respectable films, you kill them. their art, their greatness, is that they are not respected."

There is nothing honorable about James Fargo "Forced Revenge" starring Chuck Norris, but it's Americanized kung fu comfort food that's hit the spot many times in my life - and, in this day and age, action subgenres don't need to be Americanized to connect with American viewers because the action is a universal language. It's exposition, combat, plot, combat, more plot, combat, and so on. And these foreign-made films are so formulaic that you know exactly what's going on, even if you watch them without subtitles.

This is how the French knock-off of "Taken" could be at the top of Netflix's streaming top 10 in early 2025.

According to FlixPatrolAd Vitam, directed by Rodolphe Lauga, is the most popular movie on Netflix since it debuted three days ago. The French film stars Guillaume Canet (a prolific actor-director probably best known to American audiences as Leonardo DiCaprio's rival for Virginie Ledouen's affections in "The Beach") as a disgraced cop whose pregnant wife (Stephane Caillard) is kidnapped and held hostage by the bad guy. guys who need Kanet to use his special skill set to their advantage. Check out the trailer for the movie on YouTube and you'll see Canet running across rooftops, shooting guns, riding a motorbike and doing a bit of parkour as he tries to ensure Caillard's safety.

We're straight into "Taken"-ville here, a place where a veteran actor like Kane might be able to build a solid one-man-army franchise. The film has yet to receive enough reviews from Metacritic-approved critics to merit a rating, but Monica Castillo of RogerEbert.com docked the film a one-and-a-half-star review for failing in the character department. Again, we're not looking for high art from "Ad Vitam," but you need emotional buy-in to reach that quick third act high; otherwise, you might be watching a random UFC fight.

As one of the most popular movies on Netflix right now, millions of people around the world are giving it a go, and at 95 minutes, it's not much of a time commitment. If you like watching highly trained bad guys rescue their kidnapped spouses, this could be your action junk.