Nobody ever claimed this was a great movie, but surely the fact that nearly 25 minutes were cut from the U.S. release (retitled "Crossing the Line" from original "The Big Man") explains why no one was enthusiastic about it over here. I finally got around to watching the cut version (still the only one available in the U.S., I believe), and it seems choppy and formulaic in a way that suggests the extras that often make all the difference-atmosphere, character background, nuance-were exactly what got cut. This results in a movie that should be better, particularly with this cast, but never rises above adequate.
The family's struggles in a tough Scottish economy, the criminal connections Neeson is lured into et al. aren't properly established before they're taken for granted by the narrative, giving them little force. In particularly, Whalley-Kilmer hardly has a character to play, though she and the kids are the entire reason Neeson's figure lets himself get sucked into the fighting he doesn't at all want to do save for the money. Hugh Grant turns up briefly, and in this edit, it's not even clear who his character is or why he's here.
When we finally get to a proper fight (opposite Rab Affleck, who'd been a champion boxer in real life before this movie started his acting career), it's powerfully brutal. Neeson fans will probably never have seen him in such spectacular physical condition before, and he's fully committed in acting terms here as well. The later parts of the film feel less truncated than the early progress, which presumably most of the American-release cuts came out of, so it does get better.
Yet in its U.S. cut, at least, this isn't exactly a good boxing, domestic or crime drama, but an underdeveloped muddle of all three. While it's still not a bad film, you can certainly tell they had something better in mind. The much higher regard it's held in by people who've seen the two-hour "Big Man" version makes it clear that that's the film to see, not "Crossing the Line."
