Premise: Remember the first film? Remember the chills you got when our would-be thieves found out that “The Blind Man” was in fact a trained killer harboring some pretty dark secrets in his basement? Remember holding your breath as the remaining thieves tried to sneak around the house so that they wouldn’t get caught? Remember being grossed out when “The Blind Man” attempted to turkeybast his splooge into our film’s heroine? Remember finding out “The Blind Man” was still alive and our heroine was now on the run? Well take those feelings and shove them because “The Blind Man” is back but this time he has a “daughter” that he’s not trying to turkeybast. She gets kidnapped and he will do anything to get her back. It’s basically Taken.
What I Didn’t Like: The original was pretty heavy on the suspense and thriller. The sequel tries to live up to the same energy, but it hard when our protagonist is a little girl because we the viewers know this isn’t a horror film that will kill this little girl. She holds the plot together. Without her the film falls apart. So there really is no suspense.
I can’t tell how far away from the original is this story picking up from. It likely doesn’t matter, but it probably shouldn’t be called a sequel.
As I watched, I couldn’t shake my disappointment in how this qualified to carry over the plot of the original. “The Blind man”/Norman Nordstorm (Stephan Lang) is somehow redeemed in this sequel, but not by much. He keeps his “daughter” under lock down. He has lied about her origins. It someone how he’s supposed to be less abhorrent than the one’s that kidnapped her. It’s treat the events of the first film like it never happened.
Let’s not forget…he’s a rapist wanting to recreate his daughter at any cost.
As a standalone film it’s alot of questions the audience is forced to ask itself about our “hero’s” motives.
What I Liked: There’s some pretty great action scenes. It’s Rambo, just blind.
Verdict: Aside from a few great scenes, and the acting chops of Stephan Lang, the gore and plot are cartoonish. Nothing compares to the creativity of the original/first film. The prequel was a game of red light, green light. The sequel is hide and seek. Both are really fun games. Just a matter of preference which one you like to play.