"Innocent Until Proven Guilty"

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What You Need To Know:
MOST WANTED has a strong moral worldview where one character in particular wants to uncover the truth to bring an innocent man home from prison. The movie extols family when a new father says that his wife and daughter come first. There are also strong humanist elements where characters rely on their own skills and abilities. In Thailand, Buddhists are seen praying at a Thai prison, and a character says that Zen Buddhism helped him through a hard time. Finally, MOST WANTED has lots of foul language, intense violence and drug content. So, MOVIEGUIDE® advises extreme caution.
Content:
More Detail:
MOST WANTED focuses on an investigative journalist as he tries to uncover the truth about a drug bust in Thailand and help an innocent man get out of jail. MOST WANTED has a mixed worldview with elements of morality but also some humanism where some characters look out for their own interests and contains lots of foul language, some intense violence and drug content.
The movie opens with a disclaimer that the story is based on true events from 1989. Cut to the action on screen. Daniel Léger, a young Canadian man works out in the forest. When Daniel gets off work, he steals someone’s motorcycle then goes to visit his mother who doesn’t let him inside. In the meantime, an investigative journalist named Victor Malerek jets off from work to be with his wife who’s just given birth to a baby girl.
Next, Daniel, who’s been clean from drugs for six months, goes to a houseboat where he meets a drug dealer named Picker who’s secretly working with the Canadian authorizes. Reluctantly, Daniel takes some drugs under Picker’s urging and wakes up the next morning with a job offer from Picker to work on the boat. Occasionally, though, Daniel exchanges his earnings for drugs. As Picker learns that Daniel is quick on his feet, he cuts him in on a drug sting operation the Canadian feds are working. Regrettably for Daniel, the deal goes south while they’re abroad in Thailand, and he winds up in jail.
The Canadian authorities try their best to keep the failed sting operation out of the media, but Victor is too smart for them. Victor goes to Thailand to visit Daniel while in prison and learns from Daniel that the Canadian authorities paid for Daniel’s expenses for the operation, but they’re denying their involvement. To top it off, Daniel doesn’t have a criminal record like the Canadian authorities thought he did. So really, he’s just a small-town junkie, who got involved to help, but his own protection abandoned him.
Victor tells Daniel that, no matter what, he must please guilty. Daniel listens and winds up with a 100-year sentence. However, Victor doesn’t stop trying to get Daniel released, even though there are threats against his family’s safety.
MOST WANTED has compelling main characters helped by good performances from Josh Harnett as Victor and Antoine Olivier Pilon as Daniel. However, the movie follows an independent filmmaking style. For instance, many scenes are filmed with handheld cameras. This doesn’t distract but is obviously different from a major motion picture. Also, the order of events isn’t laid out for the viewer. Rather, the viewer sometimes has to piece together what’s present day or what’s the past.
MOST WANTED has a moral worldview where one character in particular wants to uncover the truth to bring an innocent man home from prison. The movie also extols family when a new father says his wife and daughter come first. There are also strong humanist elements where characters rely on their own skills and abilities. In Thailand, Buddhists are seen praying in prison, and one character says Zen Buddhism helped him through a hard time. Finally, MOST WANTED has lots of foul language, intense violence and drug content. So, MOVIEGUIDE® advises extreme caution.