User Reviews

Before I entered the theaters in Belgium, The Expatriate was an enigma. I couldn't find any reviews or critics about this movie. That's why I'm making a review myself now.

In The Expatriate Aaron Eckhart plays Ben Logan, a security specialist who works for Halgate, a big corporation. He works for the Belgian part of the company, living with his daughter in Antwerp. Throughout the movie we learn that nothing is what it looks like.

The movie is mostly filmed in Belgium,in the big cities Brussels and Antwerp. To me, Belgium gives a very dark and slightly poor impression, aside from the international corporate buildings. That's not exactly true in real life, but it gives a certain feel to the film.

Aaron Eckhart is the lead actor, and gives a good performance. He really carries the film. Liana Libertaro was a pleasant surprise, you could really relate to her character. The biggest disappointment was Olga Kurylenko, she played a seemingly useless character with whom you feel no emotional connection.

The film is a low budget movie, which is an advantage, rather than a disadvantage. The movie feels very real, as if it could really happen.

The story is not a typical Hollywood movie story, with a good pace and characters you can really relate to. You will be entertained when you go watch it.

The Expatriate is one film that had the misfortune of having its trailer tell the entire story. Whoever did this promo clip ought to have taken a long hard look at his or her final work, and wonder how it could have been done without revealing too much. Making it worse is the admiration for Taken with the kidnapping of a daughter with the father in high pursuit, which gives the unfair impression that this is a cheap knock off, which it is not.

Written by Arash Amel and directed by German Philipp Stolzl, The Expatriate is almost like a Jason Bourne movie, with lead character Ben Logan (Aaron Eckhart) exhibiting a particular skillset that surprises his daughter Amy (Liana Liberato), who had gone to Brussels in order to spend some quality Dad time, only for the world as she knows go into a topsy-turvy. They get shot at multiple times by different pursuers, have the cops looking for them, and his dad's co-workers all wind up dead. To make matters worse, they have to discover why they're in someone else's bad books, and have to make it out alive when odds become increasingly stacked against them. But it went from Bourne to Taken with that kidnapping of Amy, though thankfully it was something more of an unnecessary sub-arc just to get Ben to be acting alone in the climax, with the villains using her as a bargaining chip to keep Ben at bay.

In essence, this turned out to be a standard action thriller that involves big bad corporations and covert agencies with sneaky agents who are comfortable out their doing the dirty work for whoever can pay a good price. Not to mention some behind the scenes, under table collaboration and influence that corrupt corporation big wigs have over those in the seat of power, since any campaign requires backing, usually of the financial kind. Here, we see how corporations obtain inside knowledge from those who can be bought, which makes it especially easy when these officials also have a selfish interest to pursue. In The Expatriate, this involves technology, framing, and the need to obtain classified documents so that they can either be altered or destroyed to avoid further implication, especially when something else gains worldwide attention, and further investigation would bring to light many embarrassing points.

Aaron Eckhart remains one of my favourite character actors, but as an action hero, I'm afraid not. The filmmakers tried to cover up using very Bourne techniques of fast edits and quick cuts, but it's too obvious Eckhart is no fighter, and was found a little bit wanting in action scenes. Those that require a little more brains than brawn, highlighting his skill as a black ops engineer, was more believable. And there was a bit on the details gone into assembling a briefcase bomb as well, though not as instructional for obvious reasons. Liana Liberato would likely polarize audiences though, because her character's too whiny, and complains at almost every stage the father-daughter pair find themselves in. Although proving to be useful at times, Liana did her best with the unpopular role of whining for the most parts. And having Olga Kurylenko was nothing more than a coup to have an additional recognizable name on the marquee, her role being pretty small, used to explain some romantic liaisons between Ben and her Anna Brandt, whose loyalty gets severely questioned, and a flip-flopper when it comes to making decisions.

With an ending that depended largely on the bad guys' over-confidence that bordered on arrogance and ignorance, it was a tad too convenient, though one that would leave audiences cheering, as if having watched a feel good film. Production values are top notch for a studio film, with Belgium being used extensively on location to bring about that Europe-chic feel that's fast becoming locations that any self-respective action-thriller must have. Recommend!

This "Taken" type ex CIA father and teenage daughter action thriller was filmed on location in Belgium and stars good stars Aaron Eckhart and Olga Kurleynko. The latter looked like a young Catherine Zeta Jones in this movie. I was looking forward to it but after watching it I can see why it didn't get a wide theatrical release. The story isn't that good and the characters are interesting or well drawn.

It's too bad the story loses steam around the middle. The ending is moderately satisfying but doesn't make up for the overall feeling of a weak story. The character of the daughter played by Liana Liberato is rather bratty and annoying - she causes unnecessary chaos.

There is an unexpected positive portrayal of immigrants as victims. Quite a change from the Luc Besson type movies where often the ethnic minorities are portrayed as criminals.

Overall it was quite interesting looking at Brussels and Antwerp - cities that aren't often shown on film as they aren't the most spectacular cities in Europe. Sadly the overall feeling is that it was a let down.

For a low budget movie, I will say I enjoy the movie. Has adrenaline, has a good story, and lets agree its not perfect but I will give a honest 9 of 10. Even one can read here some aggressive reviews, Its much more logical and better performed then a "Prometeus" lets say or "Battleship", movies with a lot of lot more budget - and much worst then thin one. A movie who receive no publicity and make us to confirm - once more - the "louder" movies are worst. I am sure this movie will receive much more attention then other "famous" producers. I enjoy the movie. God work. Same for producer. I will recommend this movie because its a decent one.

this conspiracy theory structured screenplay is one of the worst i've ever encountered so far. guy hired by a ludicrous shadowy non-exist European country, Belgium, and then moved there starting his job....and this guy was an ex-CIA? are you sure you categorized all the CIA field agents like morons? then things suddenly changed totally overnight, he suddenly became a non-exist person, then the kidnapping, then the car crash, then he killed the killer with a very short-time neck choke that usually only put the choked person into sleep? then police came, both father and daughter were recognized immediately in the train station? the Belgium police might be the smartest, the most alert, the most capable and the luckiest police force in the world. they could so easily identify a person who involved in a car crash that two policemen only saw two figures, one male and one female ran away from the crash site and then within hours, they would become popular household the-most-wanted fugitives and murder suspects in Belgium? give me a break.

when the movie showed all the police force so easily recognized them, and tried to catch them in the train station, the ridiculousness and the stupidity of this movie has reached a unacceptable point and i quit from watching.

this movie had wasted a great actor's talent and is only for those who could take every stupid scenario, plot and directing for granted, not me.