The Hunted ** (2003, Tommy Lee Jones, Benicio Del Toro, Connie Nielsen) – Classic Movie Review 3673

Tommy Lee Jones enjoys another one of his popular Fugitive-style dogged tracker roles as L.T. Bonham, the military hero who first trained a mad, bad and dangerous AWOL soldier Aaron Hallam (Benicio Del Toro) to be a killer, and so is apparently the only person who can catch him now he’s gone on a killing spree.

Jones is now a FBI deep-woods tracker who sets out to try to capture the trained assassin who has made a sport out of hunting humans.

A reasonable premise, a decent enough screenplay by David and Peter Griffiths, good, pumped-up actors and pacy, professional direction from William Friedkin combine to make this lively 2003 action thriller enjoyable enough.

But nobody can entirely disguise the fact that it’s only just a potboiler and has no real special class, though instead it has lots of professionalism too get it through – especially in Caleb Deschanel’s cinematography and Brian Tyler’s score.

Connie Nielsen gives a tough, no-nonsense turn as a fed, FBI Special Agent Abby Durrell.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3673

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