Prisoners

Other than maybe Gravity, this movie had the trailer that got me the most excited. It looked tense, intriguing, potentially graphic in an appropriate or terrifying way. I was hoping for the best out of what looked like it could also be a cliche mystery thriller. But then again, mystery's can be cliche with elements of horror to keep the obvious cliche's out of the foreground. So, here's to some dynamite performances and a hopefully interesting story.

Don't get me wrong, there's plenty to love about this film. Hugh Jackman in particular reminds us of his strict acting training, as he pulls off one of the most difficult roles I could perceive. He plays a man driven to the edge of his sanity when his two daughters go missing, driven so far that he takes the lone suspect into his private custody and begins to torture him for answers. It's terrifying how much support I felt for the character, despite his obvious moral dilemma conflicting him as well as the audience. Terrance Howard gives a great supporting performance as a man perhaps more against the idea than for, but more importantly so sucked in by Jackman's charisma and fervor that he too assists in the morally questionable. Viola Davis joins in the debate, questioning the right or wrong but choosing instead to turn a blind eye. It becomes a fascinating character study of these three in general.

Paul Dano plays the primary suspect, a man with a severely low IQ who seems incapable of answering the simplest questions. While I want to say he was killer in his role, he didn't have enough screen time to convince me of a spectacular performance. But he did convince me that he had the ability to bring this characters motivations and personality farther than the script allowed him to be developed. There's definitely something to be said for that. Jake Gyllenhaal is going to get a lot of praise for this movie. Honestly, I didn't feel anything strongly one way or the other. He played himself in the circumstances. And it worked, generally speaking. But that being said, he felt bland sometimes. Perhaps this wasn't his fault, but I couldn't help feeling that it was.

The movie keeps itself suspenseful and angry, making me guess what's going to happen next to characters and wondering what Jackman's reaction will be to certain situations. But that being said, my biggest problem was what so many mystery stories eventually succumb to - obvious plot twists. Now that's not to say that I could predict anything that the characters were doing on screen, per-say. But we see every cliche of mystery stories here - the obviously involved, the red herring, the too-innocent-to-be-innocent, the obvious missed clue, etc. The cops in this film are downright idiotic, missing connections and clues that we the audience made in a grand total of, oh, 5 seconds. The whole maze connection took a painfully long time to be made, as an audience member having made it in the first shot of the damn thing. The obviously guilty was there too, as soon as this person was on screen I knew exactly who did it. Sure, I didn't know motivations or reactions. But I wouldn't call it particularly fun to know the culprit, even if motivations are a mystery.

So all in all, there's a lot to respect in this film. But that being said, there's also plenty left to be desired. I wish it was more of a mystery, and I wish it would have left me guessing outcomes a bit more. But, I guess what can I really expect from a mystery based on a best selling novel? At least we got some pretty solid oscar nomination possibilities.

Rank - 4/5