# The Marksman (2021 film)
*The Marksman* is a 2021 American action thriller directed by Robert Lorenz, starring [Liam Neeson](https://www.edgepedia.org/liam-neeson) as Jim Hanson, a widowed Arizona rancher and former Marine who escorts an 11-year-old Mexican boy, Miguel (Jacob Perez), to family in Chicago while fleeing cartel assassins led by Mauricio ([Juan Pablo Raba](https://www.edgepedia.org/juan-pablo-raba)).[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) It was released theatrically in the United States on January 15, 2021, and grossed $15.5 million domestically.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Director / writers | Robert Lorenz; screenplay by Chris Charles, Danny Kravitz, and Robert Lorenz[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) |
| Cast | Liam Neeson (Jim Hanson), Jacob Perez (Miguel), Teresa Ruiz (Rosa), Katheryn Winnick (Sarah), Juan Pablo Raba (Mauricio)[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) |
| Release | US theaters January 15, 2021 (wide); streaming March 23, 2021[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) |
| Runtime / rating | 1h 47m; PG-13 for violence, some bloody images, and brief strong language[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) |
| Box office | $15.5 million gross in the United States; about $23 million worldwide[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) • [2](https://www.tomsguide.com/entertainment/netflix/netflix-just-added-a-gripping-action-thriller-movie-with-liam-neeson-and-its-surprisingly-overlooked) |
| Critical reception | 38% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer (109 reviews); 44 Metascore on Metacritic; 83% audience Popcornmeter[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) • [3](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-marksman/critic-reviews/) |
| Distributor | Open Road[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
Jim Hanson lives alone on a ranch along the Mexico–Arizona border, fending off foreclosure and patrolling his land with his dog Jackson while reporting crossings to the Border Patrol.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) • [4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/the-marksman-movie-review/2021/01/12/f1d11164-512e-11eb-b96e-0e54447b23a1_story.html) When Rosa (Teresa Ruiz) and her 11-year-old son Miguel cross the border fleeing a cartel that has killed her brother for allegedly betraying it, they are abandoned by their coyote and stopped on Jim's land.[5](https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/the-marksman-release-date-news) Before the Border Patrol can arrive, cartel gunmen led by Mauricio pull up, and a shoot-out leaves Rosa fatally wounded.[5](https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/the-marksman-release-date-news)
With her dying breath, Rosa gives Jim a Chicago address and asks him to take her son to her family there.[5](https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/the-marksman-release-date-news) Jim, torn between guilt over Rosa's death and the possibility that the cash she carried to pay the coyote could save his ranch, breaks Miguel out of a Border Patrol station and drives north with the cartel in pursuit.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) • [5](https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/the-marksman-release-date-news) His stepdaughter Sarah ([Katheryn Winnick](https://www.edgepedia.org/katheryn-winnick)), a Border Patrol agent, tracks the pair and tries to persuade Jim to turn himself in.[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/the-marksman-movie-review/2021/01/12/f1d11164-512e-11eb-b96e-0e54447b23a1_story.html) The chase ends on a Midwestern farm, where Jim uses his military sharpshooting skills in a final fight to defend the boy.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021)
## Production and creative background
**Robert Lorenz** directed the film and co-wrote the screenplay. He had worked with [Clint Eastwood](https://www.edgepedia.org/clint-eastwood) for roughly two decades, producing films including *Million Dollar Baby* and *Gran Torino* and directing Eastwood in *[Trouble with the Curve](https://www.edgepedia.org/trouble-with-the-curve)*; reviewers noted that *The Marksman* aims for the cranky-old-man-on-a-mission register of Eastwood's later films.[6](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-marksman-movie-review-2021) Netflix's promotional material describes Lorenz as a three-time Oscar-nominated producer, and the film was his first collaboration with Neeson; Lorenz later directed him again in *[In the Land of Saints and Sinners](https://www.edgepedia.org/in-the-land-of-saints-and-sinners)* (2023).[5](https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/the-marksman-release-date-news)
The film was produced by Tai Duncan, Mark Williams, Warren Goz, Eric Gold, and Robert Lorenz, with production companies including Stonehouse Motion Pictures, Voltage Pictures, and Sculptor Media.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) Mark Patten was the cinematographer, Sean Callery composed the score, and Luis Carballar edited.[6](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-marksman-movie-review-2021) The story is not based on a book, though a novelization was published after the film's release.[5](https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/the-marksman-release-date-news)
## Reception
**Critics** were largely unenthusiastic. On Rotten Tomatoes the film scored 38 percent on the Tomatometer, with 41 fresh and 68 rotten reviews out of 109, and the site's critics consensus reads: "The Marksman benefits from having Liam Neeson in the lead, but this formulaic action thriller should have aimed higher."[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) Metacritic assigned a Metascore of 44, categorized as mixed or average, based on 22 critic reviews.[3](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-marksman/critic-reviews/) Christy Lemire of RogerEbert.com called it "particularly mediocre," finding the story thin and the action uninspired.[6](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-marksman-movie-review-2021) [The Hollywood Reporter](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-hollywood-reporter)'s Frank Scheck was more positive, writing that the film displays "the measured pacing and tautness marking many of Eastwood's films" and that Neeson reveals an emotional vulnerability that proves relatable.[3](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-marksman/critic-reviews/) Several reviewers singled out Jacob Perez's performance as Miguel; Bill Goodykoontz of the Arizona Republic credited the boy's "hard-won wisdom beyond his years" with making the character winning.[3](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-marksman/critic-reviews/)
**Audience scores** diverged sharply from the critics': the Rotten Tomatoes Popcornmeter, based on more than 1,000 verified ratings, stood at 83 percent with an average of 4.2 out of 5.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021)
**Box office** returns were modest. The film grossed $15.5 million in the United States, and about $23 million worldwide, a performance shaped in part by pandemic-era theater conditions.[1](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021) • [2](https://www.tomsguide.com/entertainment/netflix/netflix-just-added-a-gripping-action-thriller-movie-with-liam-neeson-and-its-surprisingly-overlooked)
## Later streaming life
The film found a larger audience on streaming. After it was added to Netflix in November 2025, it climbed to the No. 1 position on the service's top 10 most-watched list, following a similar Netflix success that year for another Neeson thriller, *Ice Road: Vengeance*.[7](https://www.tomsguide.com/entertainment/netflix/3-new-to-netflix-thriller-movies-you-need-to-watch-this-week-and-one-of-them-is-already-ranked-no-1-nov-18-24) Commentators attributed the streaming uptake to the familiarity of Neeson's action-hero persona rather than to the film's reviews.[7](https://www.tomsguide.com/entertainment/netflix/3-new-to-netflix-thriller-movies-you-need-to-watch-this-week-and-one-of-them-is-already-ranked-no-1-nov-18-24)
## Place in Neeson's career and the border-film genre
*The Marksman* belongs to the run of action thrillers in which Neeson plays a gruff, grieving man with a particular set of lethal skills, a pattern critics have treated as its own subgenre since the *Taken* films.[6](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-marksman-movie-review-2021) Michael O'Sullivan of The Washington Post described the character as the stock figure of Neeson's recent filmography, the solitary hero who alone can save a helpless victim, and called the film "the cinematic version of comfort food."[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/the-marksman-movie-review/2021/01/12/f1d11164-512e-11eb-b96e-0e54447b23a1_story.html) Reviewers also placed it among the US–Mexico border films released in the same period; the [Chicago Sun-Times](https://www.edgepedia.org/chicago-sun-times) reviewed it alongside *No Man's Land* as border action films that fell short in different ways.[8](https://chicago.suntimes.com/movies-and-tv/2021/1/22/22242591/marksman-review-no-mans-land-liam-neeson-movie-border-mexico-immigration) Katie Walsh of the [Chicago Tribune](https://www.edgepedia.org/chicago-tribune) argued the film wanted to evoke an old-school lone-ranger American hero, played by an actor from [Northern Ireland](https://www.edgepedia.org/northern-ireland), but was too vague to say much about its border setting.[3](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-marksman/critic-reviews/)
## References
1. [The Marksman (2021), Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_marksman_2021)
2. [Netflix just added a gripping action-thriller movie with Liam Neeson, Tom's Guide](https://www.tomsguide.com/entertainment/netflix/netflix-just-added-a-gripping-action-thriller-movie-with-liam-neeson-and-its-surprisingly-overlooked)
3. [The Marksman critic reviews, Metacritic](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-marksman/critic-reviews/)
4. [Liam Neeson shoots bad guys, charms audience in the middlebrow 'The Marksman', The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/the-marksman-movie-review/2021/01/12/f1d11164-512e-11eb-b96e-0e54447b23a1_story.html)
5. [Liam Neeson in The Marksman: Cast, News, Where to Stream, Netflix Tudum](https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/the-marksman-release-date-news)
6. [The Marksman movie review & film summary, RogerEbert.com](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-marksman-movie-review-2021)
7. [3 new to Netflix thriller movies you need to watch this week, Tom's Guide](https://www.tomsguide.com/entertainment/netflix/3-new-to-netflix-thriller-movies-you-need-to-watch-this-week-and-one-of-them-is-already-ranked-no-1-nov-18-24)
8. ['No Man's Land,' 'The Marksman' review: Border films fail in different ways, Chicago Sun-Times](https://chicago.suntimes.com/movies-and-tv/2021/1/22/22242591/marksman-review-no-mans-land-liam-neeson-movie-border-mexico-immigration)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Action and adventure films (individual works) › Action thrillers, 2020s › Crime, assassin, and vigilante thrillers › Titles M to Y*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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