Great cinematography, underwhelming story

Rating: 7/10 (29 December 2013)

Denis Villeneuve delivers a movie with perfect cinematography: the direction and mise-en-scène are top-notch especially with regards to the work done on lighting, the shots are almost of surgical precision and perfectly underline the narration.
Speaking about the content now, the story is relatively captivating, as is the atmosphere, and carried by an excellent Jackman Gyllenhaal duo. But the movie loses too much time trying to develop a plot and characters that ultimately are quite shallow.
A lot of scenes are very conventional and don't help broaden the perspective, and you even sense some hesitation on the writing at the end especially regarding the false leads which are not properly integrated and seem to serve no purpose whatsoever.
As the movie progresses and the outcome unfolds, you begin to realise the banality of the story, its lack of impact and depth on every level.
It is therefore a nice package but that sounds a bit empty, you don't end up overwhelmed after watching Prisoners, far from it, it's actually more of a certain disappointment that emerges considering there was better to do with these elements.