The Takeover film review: Fastpaced hacker thriller can’t avoid genre cliches

Cast: Holly Mae Brood, Frank Lammers, Geza Weisz, Susan Radder, Walid Benmbarek, Noortje Herlaar, Lawrence Sheldon

Director: Annemarie van de Mond

Language: Dutch with Hindi and English audio options

Hacking, facial scan abuse and data theft mingle with old-school murder and blackmail in Annemarie van de Mond’s Dutch thriller, which unfolds as an uncomplicated potboiler despite its twisted undercurrent pertaining to cyber intrusion of privacy. The Takeover spins a story of suspense that would mostly seem familiar, though the film is fast-paced enough to keep you engrossed all along. You spot influences as varied as Eagle Eye, Enemy Of The State, The Net, Swordfish and — in its breakneck finale — a busload of stunts that might seem like a cyber-age update to the Keanu Reeves-starrer Speed. The overall mood is almost a trifling one, as if underlined by the pop electronica beats that backdrop the early title scenes.

The plot centres on ethical hacker Mel Bandison (Holly Mae Brood), who works with a small like-minded group that tracks criminal hackers and then turns them over to the cops. The leader of the group is Buddy (Frank Lammers). Mel’s job requires her to hack into systems, run security checks, deal with delicate data and retrieve stolen data for clients. Action in her story starts soon enough when a couple of strangers break into her home one night, obviously intending to kill her.

Mel escapes and goes to the police station seeking protection, but is in for a shock. It seems like she is wanted by the police and she soon realises why. Horrified, she finds herself staring at a news TV footage that shows her killing a man. Chased by dangerous people out to kill her and wanted by cops for a murder she never committed, Mel is now on the run. She realises she must clear her name but time is not on her side.

The whys and wherefores of Mel’s plight, of course, have to do with her job as a hacker, and the basic challenge for screenwriters setting up a narrative around a technical subject as hacking is to keep the storyline lucid enough for the lay viewer to grasp and yet avoid getting too dumb about it. The film’s writers Hans Erik Kraan and Tijs van Marle try finding a solution by introducing a character that is far removed from the world of hacking, and throwing him into the thick of action. So, Geza Weisz as Thomas Deen, Mel’s awkward date from the night before, gets dragged into her misadventure. Thomas’ significance as a sidekick in the screenplay is mainly restricted to wailing for explanation on the technical jargon that Mel and her pals exchange. In turn, these technical aspects are explained for the benefit of the audience, through dialogues of the hacker ‘experts’ on screen.

The narrative gets Mel on the run quite early, within less than half an hour. For a film with a tight runtime of 87 minutes, you would think the actual story, meant to unfold over the final hour, would be packed with spectacular action and twists. It isn’t, and that is the film’s big shortcoming.

Interestingly, the story, which banks on the topic of cyber privacy and personal data theft, manages to set up a Chinese connection in the villainy that it sets up. We understand early on that Mel has inadvertently messed with some very powerful people while trying to execute a hack job to protect one of her clients. A Trojan Horse she introduced to safeguard her client’s interest affected a multinational firm named Xiao Ming, among others. The firm uses facial scan technology to collect personal data from its global consumer base and then passes on the same to the Chinese government. This particular aspect of the script could have led to a cracker of a thriller. Instead, the narrative merely uses it as a plot pusher, to line up the requisite quota of villains in Mel’s story.

Director Annemarie van de Mond’s execution is quite basic: It is about raising a few problems for the protagonist in the first half and then tying up the loose ends in the second. Although the narrative maintains pace all through, the film could have done with a lot more smart twists. Neither the storytelling nor the directorial treatment of the film reveals ambition to push the generic envelope. The Takeover has it all, from choreographed stunts to FX-loaded chases. Yet, it is all too formulaic and reminiscent of a countless such sequences seen on screen before. If the film was meant to be a generic tribute, it doesn’t fulfil the criterion simply because it lacks in imagination. Technically, the film is salvaged by Willem Helwig’s cinematography, which renders an authentic vibe to the action scenes, and Fatih Tura’s crisp editing that ensures there are no boring spells all through the runtime.

To set up drama of convenience, the makers primarily bank on the cliche that every time Mel is being chased by someone she will outrun the villain/s against all odds. The film moves on a linear track that solely focuses on the suspense quotient, so despite its feel-good vibes there is little room for humour (“In movies, the hackers they show are thinner and younger,” Thomas tells Mel, upon seeing the chubby Buddy in the odd comic scene). Neither is there much scope for romance, unless you count Mel and Thomas discussing codes amidst psychedelic lights. It is a screenplay that doesn’t offer challenging roles to its cast, though Holly Mae Brood as Mel exudes bankable screen presence. Brood tends to overdo herself in the odd scene of melodrama but she sure strikes a neat kick in the action sequences.

The Takeover is worth your time if the hacker-verse intrigues you. The film is engaging in the way it sets up action drama around the concept. A runtime of 87 minutes was never enough to delve deep into the cyber mystery the storyline sets out to explore, and the makers have been practical enough to restrict the drama to formulaic physical action of an on-the-run caper. If you dig action thriller stereotypes served with a twist of hacker suspense drama, the film is good enough for a one-time watch.

Rating: * * & 1/2 (two and a half stars out of five)

Vinayak Chakravorty is a critic, columnist, and film journalist based in Delhi-NCR.

Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News, India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.