Prisoners (2013)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Prisoners (2013) – D. Villeneuve

Relentlessly malevolent (and probably not the picture to watch if you are the parent of small ones), this thriller nevertheless shows director Denis Villeneuve’s talent at building and sustaining tension while abiding by the audience’s expectations. Two families see their youngest members abducted on Thanksgiving and Jake Gyllenhaal is the police detective assigned to find the abductor and get them back.  I haven’t seen Taken or its sequels, so I’m not sure how this fits into the apparent genre – but parent Hugh Jackman decides to take the investigation into his own hands and his fury means that he isn’t subtle.  I don’t think we are meant to identify with Jackman, because everything he does seems to alienate the viewer (and threaten his relationships with everyone else, including his wife, Maria Bello, and the other couple, Viola Davis and Terrence Howard).  As the hunt for the abductor continues, the clues pile up, suspects are tracked down, creepiness abounds (and tends to dominate over the sadness and disgust that would otherwise be the main feeling, since we are dealing with child abduction and possible paedophilia here).  You might catch a bit of a Silence of the Lambs vibe, I suppose.  Gyllenhaal is dogged in his pursuit of all leads, although the police action is pretty genre-consistent at best. In the end, things do get tied up with a bow, but I’ve read that an even darker ending was proposed – that probably would have made for a better film.