Prisoners Review

Jake Gyllenhall has a word with a suspect in Prisoners

Photo Credit: Warner Brothers Picutres

Prisoners

A

A Review by Frederick Cholowski

Lately, most of the police procedural “Whodunit” genre has been reserved for long form TV serials, ones that drag out the story for a variety of hours. It’s been a while since a police procedural been a feature length, shorter form film, despite the genre seeming best fit for the shorter experience. Prisoners, the first film of the fall Oscar crop, aims to rectify this by putting the dark and moody police procedural back on the big screen again. The result is a dazzling and emotionally draining film and easily one of the best films of the year.

Prisoners opens following two suburban families whose youngest members (Erin Gerasimovich and Kyla Drew Simmons), two young daughters go missing during a get together on Thanksgiving. Of course mad panic ensues as everyone assumes it to be a kidnapping especially after an RV was spotter earlier. This sends everyone into chaos and Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) pushed by his wife Grace (Maria Bello) tries to take matters in his own hands and refuses to follow direction of the driven detective put on the case detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhall). The two have a back and forth battle throughout the case especially in regards to the man who drives the RV Alex Jones (Paul Dano). Loki believes the man is innocent but Dover has different theories and thinks that the best way to solve it may be through some nastier methods.

Prisoners may seem like a generic mystery thriller on the surface, which in a way may be true, but that can be ignored simply on how well the film is executed. Every level of this film is near flawless. The script behind this film tells a straight forward story with a few twists here and there that aren’t all that surprising. Where it shines though is in the main characters. Both Keller, and Loki are fantastic three dimensional that are constantly evolving as the film goes on. As the events get darker and darker the characters keep getting deeper and more complicating each doing unexpected things whole still keeping in their respective characters. The film feels very smart with its characters and never seems like it’s pulling contrivances or twists for the sake of twists. That in this day of the thriller is quite fantastic.

The other part of the script that is fantastic is just how intense the goings ons of this film are. Every sequence of the film is filled with a level of darkness and intensity that can be at times brutal to watch. The darkness and brutality just gives the film energy of which to run off of, and that energy is propelled throughout the entire film.

It helps that the performances contained in this film are all spectacular. This is a beautifully star studded cast with most everyone having either been nominated or have won an Oscar at one point in their careers. Hugh Jackman is fantastically intense and nuanced in this film. This is easily Jackman’s best performance to date, even better than his virtuosic performance in Les Miserables last year. Jake Gyllenhall has climbed yet another acting level in this film. His cold yet completely involved detective Loki is amazing. He has a cool to him but at the same time it seems that he is always ready to burst at any point and that it may only take a small thing to knock him off his rocker. The rest of the cast is also spectacular; Terrance Howard and Viola Davis are nearly just as brilliant in their on screen time as the parents of the other little girl. Their constant unease with everything that’s going on with the Dovers adds an extra level of unease for the audience. Maria Bello is fantastic in the few scenes that she gets, as she is great at one of the most unforgiving roles the emotional mother who’s lost a child. Melissa Leo show’s up as Alex Jones’ aunt and despite the, let’s call it interesting, old person makeup she seems at the top of her game in her appearances.

Even better though is the direction and cinematography. Every scene in this film oozes atmosphere and director Denis Villeneuve (a French Canadian director who directed the fantastic little film Incendies) directs the heck out of this film. Every shot feels so well crafted and moody and beautiful. It helps to have arguably the best cinematographer working today Roger Denkins on your side as it seems that past moody films that he has worked on such as his beautifully haunting work in Fargo have great influence on this film. There are so many great shots including shots of the streets on rainy nights to shots through opaque windows to shots that allow for a sense of a scary amount of openness one second and others that are claustrophobic and all to close within the next scene. The score works well too as it’s quiet when it is what it needs to be at all times, whether nearly nonexistent one moment to nearly unbearably loud the next. Overall this film is just a marvel of atmosphere and tension, magnified by its beautiful direction, cinematography, and score.

Prisoners is a beautifully executed thriller in every way. It’s smart, wonderfully acted and hauntingly atmospheric. It’s everything one could want in this kind of intelligent thriller, making it easily one of the best films this year has seen as well as being a fantastic way to kick off Oscar season.