M. Night Shyamalan is perhaps one of the most divisive filmmakers of our time. There's The Sixth Sense, Signs, and Unbreakable, his pretty universally loved early works that put him on the map. Then we have the period in the late 2000s/early 2010s when he completely fell off with The Happening, The Last Airbender, and After Earth. Recently though he has had a resurgence of films that people seem to either love or hate with Split, Old, and Knock at the Cabin, all of which I have enjoyed at least a bit. Now he's back with Trap, a film apparently largely existing as a vessel to help his daughter's music career, and I had a blast with it.
The film follows Josh Hartnett as Cooper, a girl dad taking his daughter to a concert for a very popular musician. Once there, Cooper notices a heightened police presence and several security cameras being installed, not ideal for him as he just so happens to be the serial killer terrorizing Philadelphia, and the concert just so happens to be a trap for him! The premise is pretty goofy and that's honestly what I enjoy about it. This is a movie you very clearly have to turn your brain off for and as long as you do it is a great time.
One thing I've seen people harping on is that the dialogue and delivery doesn't feel like real people talking, which on one hand I can kind of see, it isn't the most naturalistic script out there. I'm not sure that matters here though, we're following along with Hartnett's character, a psychopath trying to act normal and that's how a lot of his performance feels. We know the truth so as an audience we can look at how he's acting and think it comes off unnatural, but his character is putting on this performance so it oddly works. I think there's also a degree to which you just can't take it too seriously, this is a lot funnier of a movie than I expected and I think there's a lot of intention behind that, and a lot of the humour comes with the dialogue and delivery. So all in all, the script is a lil funky but I think that's okay, and I honestly loved Hartnett's performance, he pushes different buttons at different times very well and is a ton of fun to follow despite his character being pretty messed up.
The daughter is played by April Donoghue and I thought she was great. There was never a moment that I didn't believe that she was a die hard fangirl of this fictional pop star, and the way she portrays skepticism when her dad starts acting weird really worked for me. I also kinda loved M. Night's daughter Saleka as Lady Raven, the pop star at the heart of the trap. All the music she wrote for this is great and she performs really well both on and offstage.
Visually this is a lot of fun. The cinematography has a lot of pretty unique angles that give what could have been an average looking film a very dynamic feel, and the use of lighting makes for some awesome shots. The actual production of staging a fictional concert is really great too, it feels very authentic aside from maybe how often our main character leaves during the show.
In summation, go see this. Go in expecting a slightly ridiculous good time and I reckon you'll have one.
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