Bastille Day is a vehicle showing off Idris Elba's action hero skills and it succeeds in that respect, menacing with a suave meanness, kicking asses and taking no prisoners but all with charm. He commits to the action hero role with a screen presence that carries the film, even as the script goes down every clichéd path B-grade action movie. The Paris we see is not the City of Lights but a place where the lead actor drives his way through gritty Parisienne outskirts, avoiding bad guys, all the way drawing the viewer's eye away from the secondary actors who never get a chance to flesh out their characters. All in all a nice story with an original location.
Review of Bastille Day
