American cinephiles of a certain age (namely, millennials) are unlikely to pass up a new M. Night Shyamalan movie. A popcorn auteur and then an industry punchline, Shyamalan is now a lovable quirky underdog, a rarity, a name brand Hollywood director under 60. As much as from Marvel or Tom Cruise, audiences know what to expect from Shyamalan: small-scale, high-concept thrillers with bold twists and a casual disregard for realism. Shyamalan knows what his thing is, he knows we know, and in a charming way, he doesn’t seem to care. His latest film, Trap, might leave some viewers rolling their eyes, but those acclimatized to his brand of weird will forgive the flaws the way they do their dad’s corny jokes.
|
TRAP ★1/2 (1.5/4 stars) |
Trap stars Josh Hartnett as Cooper, a mild-mannered suburban father who’s brought his daughter Riley (Ariel Donoghue) to Philadelphia to see her favorite pop star. Before long, Cooper notices that the concert arena is absolutely swarming with cops and FBI agents, and learns that the authorities are on the hunt for a notorious serial killer who they believe is in attendance. Most parents would be concerned that this puts their child in danger, but Cooper has a different worry: He’s the serial killer. Over the course of the concert, Cooper must evade the police dragnet and escape, all without drawing suspicion or ruining his daughter’s big day.
The execution is no less contrived and is advanced as much by coincidence as by the killer’s cleverness. Nearly every interaction or line of dialogue moves the plot forward, making this feel less like a thriller and more like a video game. Each new character or location offers a clue, a key, a means of progressing to the next stage. To stretch the video game analogy further, each stage is followed by a check-in with Riley and a song or two from Lady Raven (Saleka Shyamalan, more on her later), as if this is how Cooper saves his progress after each mission. Some storytellers might conceal or dress up this sort of mechanism with specific characters or voicey dialogue, never Shyamalan’s strong suit. The story is populated with familiar archetypes, and the dialogue is too heightened to feel authentic but not heightened enough to feel stylized.
All of this is par for the course for Shyamalan, whose skillful blocking and careful camera choreography usually compensates for his offbeat depictions of human behavior. Trap, however, is more restrained than Old or Knock at the Cabin, and lacks any jaw-dropping visuals. As expected, there are borderline ridiculous twists as likely to provoke laughs as gasps, but while some recent M. Night joints have left me wondering whether or not the storyteller is in on the joke, this time he definitely knows what he’s doing.
Trap is most endearing when it focuses on the bond between Cooper and his daughter Riley. Cooper’s “aw shucks” dad persona may cover for his darker double life, but it’s not altogether phony. There’s a scene in which Cooper steps back and observes an important moment for Riley — a moment he himself engineered — and basks in paternal pride. It’s humanizing, but it also embodies the stakes of the story. If he’s caught, Cooper will have no more moments like this. These glimmers of inner conflict flesh out an otherwise stock characterization of a compulsive killer informed by dated pop psychology, with which Hartnett does his level best.
The soundtrack to this tale of father-daughter bonding is provided by Saleka Shyamalan, M. Night’s daughter, who performs the role of pop star Lady Raven. One could easily imagine that this entire project was reverse-engineered from the desire to stage an arena-scale concert film for Saleka, a relatively obscure singer-songwriter, and significantly elevate her profile in the process. Saleka — or rather, Lady Raven — is a larger role even than the marketing suggests and arguably the center of the film. Her music doesn’t make much of an impression, but I’m a jaded 35-year-old rock songwriter admittedly out of touch with r&b inflected sad-girl pop. Your mileage may vary as to whether the music is serving the film or the film is serving the music.
As I wrote in my review of The Watchers, the feature directorial debut of M. Night Shyamalan’s younger daughter Ishana Night Shyamalan, I find such transparent, unabashed family patronage to be charmingly honest. Trap is the story of a proud dad who wants to create great memories with his daughter and gets side-tracked by his other life, which he has tried hard to keep separate. For Cooper, the collision between his two identities is a disaster. For M. Night Shyamalan, there is no such conflict. He can be a proud dad who creates great memories with his daughter while doing his other job as a spooky storyteller. There’s something wholesome about that.
Is subsidizing this family bonding worth your 2 hours and $15? Not particularly. But if you’ve already bought into Shyamalan as a storyteller and feel like checking in on him, he’s still there, dad jokes and all.
