Setting free the perfect thriller

Rating: 9/10 (25 June 2014)

"Prisoners" is a searing film that takes a scenario we've seen many times before and stands it on its head.
The film is about the abduction of two young girls and the way it effects their families and the police who search for them. It has a circular maze as one of its central motifs, and also has a maze of a plot. As Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman), the distraught father of one of the girls takes the law into his own hands and remorselessly pursues one of the suspects, he becomes at odds with Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) who hunts down other leads.
Both men work through the maze of clues from opposite directions with pieces of the puzzle slowly dropping into place. Finally it all comes together in a disturbing climax.
When a thriller this good comes along, we tend to start making comparisons with the greats of the genre, Hitchcock and Polanski or more recently Demme and Fincher, but if this movie reminds me of anything it's the Dutch version of George Sluizer's "The Vanishing". Not so much in superficial similarities, but because both films share a quality that was perfectly summed up by British actor Brian Cox – desolation. Although Cox was talking about Woody Allen's "Match Point", it's the lack of comfortable closure that generates that feeling, and all three films have it.
With that said however, French Canadian filmmaker, Denis Villeneuve, is a man who rejects categorising. "I'm not necessarily a thriller fan", he says, "I didn't want to make a thriller; I'm not so attracted to genre. I thought the thriller elements inside the movie were just a vehicle for something more interesting: the dramatic and moral aspects of the story".
Although we expect Jake Gyllenhaal to stretch himself in every role; it is Hugh Jackman who really challenges himself here. As Villeneuve said of him, "Good actors reach a point in their career where they just have an urge, an artistic need to explore new territory; they don't want to be prisoners of their own image and Hugh chose 'Prisoners' to move outside his comfort zone". Jackman nails the part of the self-made, self-reliant man who refuses to simply accept things as they stand.
Despite improvisation on the set by Villeneuve and the cast, much of the credit for the film's power must go to the script by Aaron Guzilowski.
When Villeneuve was given a choice of scripts after receiving serious Hollywood attention following the release of "Polytechnique", he chose Guzilowski's script. There are no red herrings in the story; everything in "Prisoners" has meaning and fits into the maze. It's such a cleverly thought out plot, brought to life on the screen by Villeneuve and his crew plus a perfect cast.
Although Villeneuve says he doesn't want to be pigeonholed in the thriller genre, lets hope he makes a few more visits before he hangs up the megaphone and folds the canvas chair.