Of all European countries aside from the UK France probably takes the crown when it comes to exporting high quality movies of all genres to every part of the world. While many other countries usually end up being known for certain genres in which they excel (historical dramas for Germany, pitch-black comedies and crime thrillers for Scandinavian countries, comedies for Italy), France has had movies in all genres succeed on a major scale. Comedy-wise Welcome to the Sticks (Bienvenue chez les Ch’tis) enticed huge audiences in Europe, leading to an Italian-language (!) remake and of course remake right being secured in Hollywood as well. France has also been one of the biggest foreign language markets for big horror movies in recent years. Movies like High Tension, Frontière(s), Inside, Martyrs and the upcoming The Pack come to mind. However, also the drama sector has been pretty big with movies like La Vie En Rose, Merry Christmas and I’ve Loved You So Long collecting accolades all around the world. With films like The Nest, District B13 and its sequel have shown that Hollywood-scale impressive action fests are being made in France as well.

This year, Point Blank represents another fine export in yet a different subgenre. This time we’re dealing with a traditional thriller. Tell No One and MR 73 have been recent examples of strong thrillers form France and Point Blank continues the tradition. The plot hardly reinvents the genre. Gilles Lellouche plays Samuel, a nurse who prevents the assassination of a patient. Next day, his pregnant wife is kidnapped and he is being blackmailed into breaking out the patient he has saved the day before. Given no choice, Samuel manages a spectacular escape with the patient from the hospital. Everything is going fine until things turn out to be not what they seem.

Without spoiling the rest of the plot, it is safe to say that the film follows the beaten path and most plot developments are rather predictable. Does that in any way diminish this thriller’s quality? Hardly. Even though it does little new, it does it so impressively that it’s easy to overlook the plot’s predictability and obvious gaps in logic. Point Blank is an extremely taut, well-paced action thriller that hardly leaves the viewer a moment to catch a breath. The short 84- minutes running time benefits the film. Time-consuming things like character development or expositions are skipped in favor of intense action sequences that keep the viewers on the edge of their seats for the film’s entire running time. There’s not a single dull moment in this and in its bets moments it reminds of Tell No One, just missing that film’s complex plot. Gilles Lellouche in particular evokes the memories of François Cluzet’s confused-man-on-the-run in that film. The character relations are simplistic here and the villains rather one-note.

All of that doesn’t matter when the film leaves you little time to think about its flaws. It just keeps going at an incredible speed and it’s over faster than you realize that what you’ve seen was nothing new, but extremely well-packaged. That alone is already more than many modern thrillers can achieve. Like in Tell No One's case I fully expect a remake to be announced for this soon.