Stars: Gary Oldman, Jean Reno, Natalie Portman, Danny Aiello, Peter Appel

Director: Luc Besson

Summary: A murder on the streets of New York Leads to a deadly game of cat and mouse while an orphaned twelve-year-old girl becomes caught in the middle...

French director Luc Besson tackles his first American movie in this unusual tale of Leon (Jean Reno), a stoic assassin who develops a reluctant relationship with an orphaned 12-year-old girl (Natalie Portman, in an excellent debut performance). When a corrupt DEA official (Gary Oldman) murders the girl's parents in a botched drug deal, the diminutive New Yorker has no one to turn to but Leon, the hit man down the hall. A combination of thrilling action and heartfelt emotion, LEON is a remarkably unique and engaging film.

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Reviewed by: cooljimbop
Posted on July 21, 2005 5:01 PM

Natalie Portman's first film, Jean Reno's finest performance and Luc Besson's greatest, this is amazing. What we have here is an action film about an assassin, and an emotional relationship he has with a 12 yr old girl he takes under his wing. This features some breathtaking gun fights and a deliciously rampant bad guy by Gary Oldman. The ending is spectacular and the whole film seems to have inspired the style of the Bourne films. Considered to be a great film by so many people, you must own this if you don't already.

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Luc Besson (The Fifth Element) made his American directorial debut with Leon, a stylised thriller about a French hit man (Jean Reno) who takes in an American girl (Natalie Portman) being pursued by a corrupt killer cop (Gary Oldman). Oldman is a little more unhinged than he should be, but there is something genuinely irresistible about the story line and the relationship between Reno and Portman. Rather than cave in to the cookie-cutter look and feel of American action pictures, Besson brings a bit of his glossy style from French hits La Femme Nikitaand Subwayto the production of The Professional, and the results are refreshing even if the bullets and explosions are awfully familiar.--Tom Keogh

Aspect Ratio:	2.35 Wide Screen
Main Language:	English
Region:	Region 2
Year:	1994
Release Date:	January 8, 2001
Runtime:	109 minutes
Certification:
Catalogue Number:	B E D 888223
Keywords:	General, Professional, Leon, Thriller
Genre:	Thriller