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#150 - Prisoners
Denis Villeneuve, 2013
When a pair of preteen girls are kidnapped, a detective is assigned to find out what happened while the father of one of the girls decides to take justice into his own hands.
Prisoners is a decent enough twist on whodunits thanks to the moral ambiguity on the part of its protagonists. Hugh Jackman has played gruff characters before, but here he gets to show some serious menace as a single-minded vigilante who is driven to find his daughter by any means necessary. Jake Gyllenhaal is decent enough as the detective following the case, even if he doesn't do anything particularly groundbreaking with either his ability or the role. That more or less goes for the rest of the cast - there are talented performers, but they're ultimately kind of wasted here. Terrence Howard is the father or the other missing girl and he believably conveys discomfort with Jackman's plan while assisting him with carrying it out. Viola Davis and Maria Bello are more or less relegated to playing worried spouses, but at least Davis gets the chance to make more out of the role. Paul Dano plays the mentally impaired prime suspect, which is a fairly thankless role but at least he does alright with it, while Melissa Leo rounds out the main cast as Dano's kind and understanding aunt.
The film as a whole is a grim and considerably violent affair, all of it photographed with aplomb by the legendary Roger Deakins (I'm pretty sure I've posted before about how any film where he serves as director of photography gets points for that alone). There are strong contrasts, good use of different types of light, the usual slow and purposeful camera movements - all of which are used to build a fairly unsettling atmosphere around one fairly twisted premise. Unfortunately, the film's story doesn't quite feel like it deserves to be two-and-a-half hours long and, while it does stay unsettling for the most part and is fairly well-performed, the climatic reveal and falling action do feel a little underwhelming considering how the rest of the movie had progressed. Prisoners is definitely worth one viewing due to its rather unusual take on a familiar genre (and, of course, that Deakins cinematography) but otherwise I don't think it being a great film.
Denis Villeneuve, 2013
When a pair of preteen girls are kidnapped, a detective is assigned to find out what happened while the father of one of the girls decides to take justice into his own hands.
Prisoners is a decent enough twist on whodunits thanks to the moral ambiguity on the part of its protagonists. Hugh Jackman has played gruff characters before, but here he gets to show some serious menace as a single-minded vigilante who is driven to find his daughter by any means necessary. Jake Gyllenhaal is decent enough as the detective following the case, even if he doesn't do anything particularly groundbreaking with either his ability or the role. That more or less goes for the rest of the cast - there are talented performers, but they're ultimately kind of wasted here. Terrence Howard is the father or the other missing girl and he believably conveys discomfort with Jackman's plan while assisting him with carrying it out. Viola Davis and Maria Bello are more or less relegated to playing worried spouses, but at least Davis gets the chance to make more out of the role. Paul Dano plays the mentally impaired prime suspect, which is a fairly thankless role but at least he does alright with it, while Melissa Leo rounds out the main cast as Dano's kind and understanding aunt.
The film as a whole is a grim and considerably violent affair, all of it photographed with aplomb by the legendary Roger Deakins (I'm pretty sure I've posted before about how any film where he serves as director of photography gets points for that alone). There are strong contrasts, good use of different types of light, the usual slow and purposeful camera movements - all of which are used to build a fairly unsettling atmosphere around one fairly twisted premise. Unfortunately, the film's story doesn't quite feel like it deserves to be two-and-a-half hours long and, while it does stay unsettling for the most part and is fairly well-performed, the climatic reveal and falling action do feel a little underwhelming considering how the rest of the movie had progressed. Prisoners is definitely worth one viewing due to its rather unusual take on a familiar genre (and, of course, that Deakins cinematography) but otherwise I don't think it being a great film.