The Negotiation (2018)

My first reaction after about 15 minutes of "The Negotiation" was a sort of deja vu of "The Negotiator", a movie that was released 20 years ago (damn, I'm getting old...). Deja vu that got even more intense after about 30 more minutes. It's not exactly the same story, but we have plenty of common elements. Let's get back though to minute 0...

The movie begins with a female negotiator of the Korean police who interrupts her day off to solve an incident with two hostages. Fail. We continue not longer after, when the same negotiator is summoned from her vacation where she was sent after trying to quit the job. A Korean arms dealer helds hostage a small group of people somewhere in Thailand apparently, and asks precisely for her presence to carry the discussions via a video stream. The negotiation doesn't really progress well, but I won't spoil much. What I can say, is that the situation escalates to a higher and higher level, and we soon find out that the guy doesn't want money. His immediate scope seems to get high positioned people in front of the camera and compromise them in from of the rest of the police involved in the action.

Unfortunately, the description above might sound a bit more promising than the movie goes. It's not a bad one, but it's predictable. Moreover, up to some point I really had the impression that the actress playing the lead female role, doesn't really do a good job. Up to some point = when even her opponent describes her as a weak negotiation, too emotional and a bad liar = maybe that explains the acting... I don't remember much of "The Negotiator" of 20 years ago, but the last time I've watched that it definitely created a better impression than what we have here on a topic that is quite similar. And somehow unexpected, from the vague memories I keep on that, I think it was maybe more... dramatic and gritty let's say than this one, stuff that's typically reversed in a Hollywood vs. Asian cinema comparison. But well, there are exceptions...

Rating: 3 out of 5