I’m not going to bother getting into my usual critique of this movie. It doesn’t deserve it. In fact, I highly recommend that if you are a parent, or if you even care about the general welfare of children, you should not support this movie with your hard-earned dollars.
There is a scene in this film that simply horrified me. Leah Banning, played by Piper Perabo, is in her kitchen, talking to her daughter, who looks to me like a less than two-year-old toddler. The toddler, Lynne Banning, played by sisters Jessica and Maisie Cobley, is not even old enough to be verbal.
In walks two gun-wielding bad guys, aiming to take the Bannings hostage. Seeing two tough guns pulling guns on the woman playing her mother, the toddler freaks out, for real. That kid was so terrified, there’s no way that anyone could argue that it wasn’t a traumatic experience for her.
Minutes later, as the bad guys and their hostages make their way out the back door, Nick Nolte appears and knifes both of them. My eyes immediately went to the young actress. Her eyes darted from Nolte to the two actors playing dead, and again, you could tell that for her, in the moment, everything was very, very real.
Shame of whomever put her in that position.