This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

Just before I wrote this review, I looked up Carjacked on IMDb and happened to notice some of the reviews on there. Pretty much all of them gave it 1/10! Now, I'm not going to say that Carjacked is a classic or that it offers anything that you haven't really seen before, but I would stress that it's a lot better than a 1/10.Single mother Maria Bello stops off for petrol (or 'gas' as they say in America) and gets carjacked by Stephen Dorff, taking her and her son hostage. What follows is basically a 'cat and mouse' sort of situation where she tries to protect her son and/or escape at the same time.There you have it - nothing new. However, it's still not as bad as a 1/10. All three lead actors play their parts well. Special mention to Stephen Dorff who flits between charming and psychotic quite nicely. Mario Bello does her best to escape, but, as is pointed out at the beginning of the film, has a history of doing the wrong thing at the wrong time, so that kind of excuses some of her subsequent bad decisions she makes throughout the rest of the movie. Even the kid, who is naturally squeaky clean, is actually not totally unlikeable and annoying (like most kids in films).So, there you have it, nothing new, but nothing bad. Although I probably wouldn't watch it again any time soon, it kept me entertained for an hour and a half.

As an awful as a movie can be sometime, I'd like to somewhat use this analogy. Carjacked Is seriously like a bad train-wreck, despite how progressively worse it gets throughout the duration, you can't help but finish the disaster all the way through. Carjacked is certainly never dull, but it has a plethora of problems. Right away we are entered into the heroine's life (Bello) and the sight isn't pretty. We are given snippets throughout the film of her insecurities, her faults, but it never really gives us any reason to care about her, other than she's broke and a single mother who's in tough financially with a jerk of an ex husband. As a matter of fact they try to make her come across as sympathetic, but in reality all they managed to do was make her a whiny and rather unlikable heroine who commits way too many stupid mistakes in tough scenario's, The criticism should not be directed towards Bello because she gives it her best shot, but the obstacle of working against a bad script is too much to overcome. The relationship with her son felt forced and unnatural, and in a movie that type of relationship is vital to a movie's success, and they throw in the ex husband scenario for further dramatic effect to no avail. Stephen Dorff gives a laughably over the top performance which is largely uninspired. He sits there with his jacket, smokes cigarettes, looks cool, but he comes across as annoying and rather pretentious. The movie doesn't give us near enough information on why he is the way he is, as like a lot of the character development. Connor Hill is predictably annoying and rather unlikable as the kid. I didn't care for his nonchalant attitude towards the occurring events happening in the film or his hypocritical attitude (The moment when he gives Dorff the middle finger on the bus is a perfect example of this) but my main problem with Carjacked is that it grows abundantly more idiotic as it goes along. The finale had me howling in unintentional laughter. I'm guessing they wanted the big bang for the finale, but they failed miserably with a terribly over the top and unbelievable finale.Final Thoughts: Maria Bello is far too talented to be slumming in this type of stuff. Carjacked is far too stupid and silly for its own good. I wouldn't even recommend this to B-Movie junkies, you can do something much more worthwhile with your time, like Maria Bello can with her career.3/10

When thinking of an 'escape' type film, the things that would generally come to mind would be intrigue, mystery, schemes and deadlocks. It is a pity then that 'Carjacked' contains none of these. In an atmosphere and complex that fluctuates from amicable chatting to sudden gun pointing for the majority of the film, the whole production, the events and the characters seem either too far fetched or too devoid of life to be believable. Usually an actress with personality, Maria Bello portrays an inherently imploded single mother struggling with life. Her character remained detached whilst her emotions were too difficult to read. The hijacker, who was really responsible for carrying the film, acted by Stephen Dorff, is not menacing and instead of a cunning bank robber, is presented as a simple petty thief, which does take away credibility, even if his demeanour is a dangerous cool. The dialogue between the two protagonists comes across as very unnatural, so much so that the movie may well have been better off without it. Whilst watching, you will likely find yourself throwing your hands in the air multiple times wondering how Bello's character Lorraine could not escape rather than find yourself absorbed in the intrigue of the plot. Dorff may well have been referring to the film as well when he refers to Lorraine as 'a whole other class of something else'. Although, he forgot to add, 'in blandness'.

Boring would be an understatement. Nothing much to start with and an abrupt ending made the movie a yawwwwn. One and a half hours of drone would sum up the case. The movie didn't even live up to my already low expectations, what with the cast and all. Its another one of those "guy kidnaps girl, threatens her kid, and makes her run around town" movies.Maria was OK and she did try to do justice to her character, but her character in itself was very weak. I don't know from where they got the kidnapper. How lamer could he get? The kidnapping fraternity was put to shame! There wasn't much to the story line either except for endless driving and idle chitter chatter to increase the runtime. More like watching a soap opera, with a few car chases. There were bits and pieces missing throughout.Knock yourself out if you have nothing better to do during the day, but this is one movie I would not dearly recommend.