“I buy back my life by killing for you.” ~Ethan Renner

It is Zooey’s birthday, but dad is at work. So starts the day for terminally-ill CIA agent who has to borrow money from a street vendor to even call his daughter and wish her a Happy Birthday. Unfortunately while on the phone with his daughter, gun fire erupts, bombs explode and chaos ensues. After getting injured in the explosion, he ends up in the hospital where he receives the bad news he needs to get his affairs in order. What a way to start the day!

If you were about to give up your dangerous lifestyle (job), what would you do to live? Kevin Costner plays CIA agent Ethan Renner who gets an offer that is almost impossible to turn down. He has three days to complete one last assassination to be rewarded an experimental drug which could save his life. His assignment is to assist Agent Vivi DeLay to find terrorists known as The Wolf and The Albino. To top it off he has to do it on a week he has agreed to watch his daughter.

He arrives home to find an entire family of squatters in his house and all of his belongings thrown into a room. He finds that there is nothing he could do to evict them, so the family becomes just one of many running comedic storylines behind the action. Another ongoing storyline is the purple bicycle that he buys his daughter Zooey. One of the more endearing moments is when he teaches his daughter to the bike. The bike is significant because of the bond they were unable to do as she was growing up.

The first thing that I found interesting is that the movie is not jam-packed with big, box-office stars. The cast includes Amy Heard as Vivi Delay, the female lead. Hailee Steinfeld is cast as his daughter Zooey. Connie Nielson plays his estranged wife. Tómas Lemarquis , plays The Albino. Richard Sammel rounds out the top-billed cast as The Wolf. The lack of big-name stars actually helps to focus on the action rather than spending time comparing the actors to their previous roles.

I love action movies with an actual storyline. The problem is that sometimes the storylines drag the action to such a low level that you find yourself waiting for the next “moment” to come. I would have liked to see a little more action and a little less of the bonding scenes, but then again it’s about a dying man who wants to reconnect with his family.

I would rate 3 Days to Kill a three out of five stars.

Rated: PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, some sensuality and language. (PG-13 movies sure are changing)

Runtime: 117 min | 123 min (Extended Edition)

I originally viewed this movie in the movie theaters and purchased this ticket with my own funds.