PRISONERS Is Gripping, Ultra-Intense Tale of Vengeance

PRISONERS Review:

- PRISONERS is a dark, twisty, enthralling thriller that, despite a long running time, kept me on the edge of my seat for its duration. Going in, I wasn't familiar with director Denis Villeneuve, but he makes an incredibly strong first impression - directing the film with old-school, stark simplicity and haunting, deliberate pacing. On the flip side, the movie is filled with top-notch actors, many doing some of the best work of their careers. This is Jake Gyllenhaal doing some of his best-yet acting. It's Hugh Jackman playing a force of nature, but a much different type of character than we're used to seeing from him. It's Melissa Leo ... well, I don't even want to say, except that she's good. Real good. Meanwhile, the film deals with some very interesting, thought-provoking, and complex themes. But if there's any major flaw here, it's that I'm not fully convinced that the movie's many interrelated themes, plot-threads, and overarching ideas come together in an impactful way. But even so, I can appreciate a potboiler that also gives you a lot of thematic meat to chew on.

The movie deals with the aftermath of a double-kidnapping. The two victims? Two little girls, friends who were gathered with their families for Thanksgiving dinner. The girls decide to sneak off, but their families panic when they're nowhere to be found. On one side of the coin is Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman), a gruff survivalist whose personal motto is to always be prepared for the worst. Keller reacts to the kidnapping by going into vigilante mode - distrustful of the police, and determined to solve the case on his own. His wife, Grace (Maria Bello) is absolutely torn up by the kidnapping. She spends her days in bed, on meds, a mess of tears and pain. On the other side is Franklin Birch (Terrence Howard) and his wife Nancy (Viola Davis). Franklin gets pulled into his friend's quest for vengeance, but reluctantly so. Franklin can see that Keller is losing it - his perspective and his moral compass - in his determination to find his daughter. This manifests in Keller's insistence that the truth lies with Alex Jones (Paul Dano), a mentally handicapped man whose RV was parked nearby the two couples' homes at the time of the abduction. Meanwhile, the cop tasked with solving the kidnapping is loner Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal). Loki finds himself with the unenviable task of tracking the girls and pursuing leads, all while keeping the increasingly unstable Keller in check.

Like I said, this is a fairly towering performance from Hugh Jackman. While there's still a residual hint of Wolverine-esque badassery in Keller, this is also a more grounded, blue-collar, salt-of-the-earth type of character than we typically see from the actor. When we first meet Keller, his grim, survivalist worldview is tempered by the love and stability of his family. But when that gets ripped away from him, the darker inclinations come to the forefront. And Jackman handles that transformation wonderfully, showing us a guy who is willing to compromise his own soul in exchange for saving that of his daughter. On the other end of the spectrum, this is one of those Jake Gyllenhaal roles where the actor gets to be at his quirkiest, which to me is a good thing. After all, this is the guy who first impressed by playing a total oddball in Donnie Darko. Here, his Detective Loki is sort of fascinating. He ponders things slowly, carefully, but then is prone to rage when things don't add up. But Loki makes for a great contrast with Keller. Loki is trying to weigh all the angles, juggle all the facts. Keller is single-minded and laser-focused.

Overall, the supporting cast is quite simply stacked. If anything, I think you end up wanting even more substantial parts of top-notch actors like Bello, Howard, and Davis. That said, the movie is overripe with plot, and there just isn't time to widen the focus too much to these peripheral characters.

The bigger problem might be theme. Writer Aaron Guzikowski and Villeneuve go big. They introduce questions about vengeance, faith, god, morality, and justice. They use Keller as an example of what can happen when one man's quest for vengeance overrides his own moral compass - creating a situation in which Keller nearly becomes the bad guy in his own story. They look at the cycle of violence, and how one evil act begets another. They give the kidnapping a religious connotation: the kidnappers wage a war against god, with the terrorist-like goal of destabilizing and breaking good men: of inspiring others to inadvertently join the crusade of evil by retaliating and repeating the perpetrator's sins. All of this is good stuff - and for a while, the movie captivates, as it dangles these big questions in front of us. But these big themes don't necessarily jive with the plot's twisty nature. With each new twist, we get thrown for a surprising loop, but the big themes of the film also, to a degree, are undermined. It's hard to talk too much about without spoiling things, except to say that as the credits roll, it feels like you've been left with a hodgepodge of half-finished ideas and themes that were only explored halfway.

Still, the plot alone makes for gripping drama, and the film builds suspense - and genuine mystery - in a way that's as effective as any crime thriller we've seen in a long while. Villeneuve - along with legendary cinematographer Roger Deakins - craft a gorgeous-looking film that gives its rural, every-town setting a palpable sense of dread and foreboding. The movie feels like a throwback in many ways, and I found it refreshing. The pacing, the cinematography, the way the movie takes its time and builds and builds and lets the atmosphere take hold - it definitely feels like a film not quite of this time (and maybe that's also the Euro-ness of it all) - which ironically gives it that sort of classic, timeless feel.

PRISONERS is a pretty fascinating film, and in all honesty it's a hard one to rate. There's so much to like here, and so much that feels atypical and applause-worthy for this sort of big-screen crime procedural. Rarely does a crime movie have this much on its mind. At the same time, it's slightly frustrating because Prisoners is just shy of being a classic, in that by its end, the movie sort of collapses under its own weight. There's a lot that doesn't quite add up, and what the movie is ultimately about, what it's ultimately saying, ends up feeling a bit lost and muddled. But the ride to get there - it's still well worth taking.

My Grade: B+
 

END OF WATCH Is One Hell of a Cop Movie

END OF WATCH Review:

- I'll admit, my expectations were a bit lowered going into END OF WATCH. The movie had the misfortune of having a subpar panel at this past July's San Diego Comic-Con. With fans gathered in the massive Hall H to see glimpses of new geek-friendly films, sandwiched in between was a look at this gritty cop flick that probably had no business being at the show. I felt bad for director David Ayer and star Michael Pena for having to be there. But look, there was no way I was going to be able to get 100% psyched for a movie like this at a place like Comic-Con. Because  End of Watch isn't a showy, epic-scale movie. It's gritty, down-to-earth, and starkly realistic. It's also super-badass and absolutely riveting. Don't worry about the hype - or lack thereof - around this one. Just know that it's one of the best cop movies in years, and an affecting, gripping drama with some killer action to boot.

What makes End of Watch click is the relationship between its two leads - Taylor (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Zavala (Michael Pena). The two actors have a fantastic, naturalistic chemistry. What they - and director David Ayer - do so well, is pepper the film with banter and small talk that feels authentic. Honestly, the conversations that the two partners have while patrolling South Central LA result in some of the funniest moments in any movie so far this year. Gyllenhaal and Pena (especially Pena, who's just hilarious) make you laugh because there's that sense while watching them that you're participating in back-and-forth with your buddies. The dialogue has an improvised feel, but it's also sharp as hell. And as the two guys banter about wives, girlfriends, race, and everything else under the sun, it serves to make the movie's serious and dramatic moments that much more intense. Because we feel like we know these guys - like these are guys who could be our friends - it's all the more riveting and jarring to see them enter dangerous - oftentimes life or death - situations. To that end, these are deceptively great performances from Gyllenhaal and Pena. These are not showy, melodramatic parts - but they're understated, naturalistic, and multifaceted. Honestly, this is some of the best overall work of Gyllenhaal's career. And same goes for Pena - who's been hilarious in movies like 30 Minutes or Less, but adds some real depth and nuance to Zavala in addition to being very funny.

The film follows Taylor and Zavala, as they go about their routine as policemen in some of Los Angeles' worst neighborhoods. We quickly how the two are perceived within the LAPD - they can be pranksters, they can be immature - some might think they are a little too buddy-buddy - but ultimately they are respected and tend to be good at their jobs. Zavala is married - his wife was his high school sweetheart. Taylor is still looking for someone to settle down with. On the side, Taylor is taking a film class, and he's begun carrying a minicam around with him on his patrols - the idea being to get footage to make a documentary about his life as a cop. This informs a lot of the film's handheld camera, found-footage aesthetic. It's also a source of tension between Taylor and his superiors, as cops on patrol are strictly forbidden from recording their activities. In any case, we follow the two as they go about their routine. We get a sense of this world, of the criminal infrastructure of Los Angeles. The gangs, the drug-dealers, the informants. The tension at times between cops, detectives, federal agents, and DEA. These tensions escalate as Taylor and Zavala get involved in taking down local dealers with ties to the cartels. Suddenly, they are mixed up in some serious stuff, and they've got targets on their backs. At the beginning of the film, we see how the pair's commitment to their jobs and to the law makes them effective cops. But as the movie progresses, we see how that same commitment can put them directly in the cross-hairs of some very bad people.

At first, I had my doubts about the film's found-footage aesthetic. But eventually, it really won me over. It did so be cause Ayer plays fast and loose with it - he isn't afraid to mix things up, and push the limits of what the cameras see, or to add some stylistic flourishes when it serves the story. The movie tends to stick to handheld camera footage when it's just the two leads on their own. But Ayer will throw in sweeping establishing shots of LA to add color and atmosphere and scale. At times, he'll shift focus to the gang of drug-dealers looking to cause trouble for the cops, at which time we see the action through an ominous night-vision lense. Other times, Ayer will borrow the aesthetic of first-person shooter games, and create a sense of you-are-there immediacy during some of the movie's most intense action scenes. It's a trick that works surprisingly well - some of the movie's big shootouts and action sequences  are total nail-biters, in large part thanks to how dynamically they are shot. As when you're playing a really intense shooter game, you're on the edge of your seat, wondering who or what lurks around every corner.

But again, the intensity and chaos of the film's gritty action scenes is tempered by the many scenes of quiet humanity and emotion. We see Taylor and Zavala's friendship at and away from work. We see Taylor kick off a relationship with a promising new girl (played with geeky likability by Anna Kendrick), that then blossoms into a real romance. We follow these characters as their lives evolve, even as we keep coming back to their existence in the dark, mean streets of LA. Essentially, Ayer deftly humanizes these characters, and makes us think about the lives that they - and real-life cops like them - lead. These are deeply flawed, all-too-human characters - but you also come away from the film thinking about the risks that cops face every day, and with a deeper understanding of what it is to be a cop.

END OF WATCH at times meanders a bit, and occasionally seems a little too in love with the banter generated from its main characters. But mostly, the movie just works - it's funny, action-packed, and surprisingly poignant. There are some things in it that are genuinely disturbing, and despite the gritty and realistic tone, the movie's also got its share of "holy $%&#" moments as well. Gyllenhaal and Pena do great work here, and easily carry the movie. The result is a badass cop story - but one with plenty of humor and heart.

My Grade: A-