PRISONERS : Official Reviews ( SPOILERS!!)

[jo]

www.hollywoodreporter.com/movie/prisoners/review/618578

Prisoners: Telluride Review

8:00 PM PDT 8/30/2013 by Stephen Farber


The Bottom Line

A difficult subject is bolstered by outstanding performances and masterly filmmaking.


Venue:

Telluride Film Festival

Cast:

Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis, Maria Bello, Terrence Howard, Melissa Leo, Paul Dano, Dylan Minnette.

Director: Denis Villeneuve

Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal lead an all-star cast in Canadian director Denis Villeneuve's thriller about the search for two abducted children.


Can a superbly crafted film overcome audience resistance to an extremely painful subject? That is a question that Warner Bros. will be pondering nervously as Prisoners moves from its festival screenings during the next week to a wide national release later in September. The movie deals with the abduction of two young children and the havoc that this trauma wreaks on the families and police officers investigating the crime. While the subject has been in the news recently, giving the film undeniable timeliness, there’s a difference between following a disturbing news story and paying to see a similar drama unfold at the multiplex. In addition, the film doesn’t flinch from graphic moments of violence and terror.


Canadian director Denis Villeneuve makes his Hollywood debut with this film. His previous film, the Oscar-nominated foreign language film Incendies, did attract an audience, even though it dealt with rape, incest, and religious hatred. Still, that was essentially an arthouse success that may not be a relevant point of comparison for a wider, major studio release. Leaving aside the movie’s uncertain commercial prospects, this much is certain: Viewers who see the movie will find it absolutely riveting, and this is a tribute to the filmmaker’s skill and to the excellent cast that brings the story to life.

The film begins indirectly but ominously as a man encourage his teenage son to hunt and kill a deer. The father, Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) is a carpenter who seems to be one of those survivalists who clings to guns and religion, but our view of him as a rightwing nutcase is modified when we see that he and his family choose to spend Thanksgiving with a black family in the neighborhood. (Terrence Howard and Viola Davis play the neighbors.) The friendship of these two families is surprising but handled naturally and believably. As everyone relaxes during the course of a long afternoon, their two young daughters go outside and never return. A suspicious looking van was spotted outside, and the parents begin to fear the worst as they contact the police, and a search for the two girls builds in intensity. The police arrest the driver of the van, Alex (Paul Dano), who turns out to be mentally impaired, but they have insufficient evidence to keep him in custody. Frustrated, Keller decides to abduct Alex and interrogate him brutally, convinced that this is the only way to save the two girls while the clock is ticking.

The film makes pertinent, provocative comments on vigilante justice, and the issues are never simplified in Aaron Guzikowski’s screenplay. Keller is fanatical, but we sense that he may have legitimate reasons for his suspicion of Alex. When he gets the neighboring couple involved in his torture plan, they are initially appalled but hesitant to stop him because they too sense that this may be the only way to save the children.



As Keller’s interrogation continues in scenes that are gruesome but never exploitative, Villeneuve frequently cuts away to follow the lead police detective (Jake Gyllenhaal), who is pursuing his own investigation that includes questioning Alex’s lonely aunt (Melissa Leo), whose troubled family history may have led her nephew astray. As the film weaves all the plot and character strands together, the vise tightens. There are some truly scary scenes as new suspects appear and the film twists its way to a dark, mordant conclusion. It’s worth remembering that Incendies, despite its Oscar nomination and excellent reviews, was essentially a high-class melodrama, and that’s the way that Prisoners should be viewed as well. And thanks to the efforts of an expert filmmaking team, it’s a smashingly effective melodrama.

Villeneuve enlisted brilliant cinematographer Roger Deakins, who captures the rainy, chilly atmosphere of this Pennsylvania community with visual eloquence. (Pennsylvania was convincingly recreated outside Atlanta.) The editing by Joel Cox and Gary D. Roach, two editors of many of Clint Eastwood’s recent movies, is also first-rate. Although the film runs two and a half hours, there doesn’t seem to be a wasted frame.


The performances also enrich the film. Jackman gives what may be the most intense and satisfying performance of his career. As the film progresses, we learn that Keller is a far more complex and tormented character than his first appearance as macho hunter suggested. A recovering alcoholic and less than perfect husband, he seems to be acting out these vigilante fantasies as a way of compensating for a deep-seated sense of inadequacy. Jackman illuminates the character’s conflicted nature without ever begging for sympathy. Gyllenhaal is also playing a troubled character, a suspicious loner who nonetheless has a strong desire to help people in need, and he wins our sympathy for this dogged detective without in any way idealizing the character. Howard and Davis are excellent, as always, though one flaw of the film is that they have too little to do in the second half of the story.

As the plot twists multiply and tension mounts, the film reaches a climax that is satisfying without being predictable. Special praise should go to the sound engineer for a shrewd touch in the very last scene that brings the story to an absolutely perfect conclusion. Prisoners can at times be a hard film to watch, but thanks to all the talent involved, it’s even harder to shake off.

Opens: Friday, Sept. 20 (Warner Bros.)

Production: Alcon Entertainment.

Cast: Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis, Maria Bello, Terrence Howard, Melissa Leo, Paul Dano, Dylan Minnette.

Director: Denis Villeneuve

Screenwriter: Aaron Guzikowski

Producers: Broderick Johnson, Kira Davis, Andrew A. Kosove, Adam Kolbrenner.

Executive producers: Edward L. McDonnell, John H. Starke, Robyn Meisinger, Mark Wahlberg, Stephen Levinson.

Director of photography: Roger A. Deakins.

Production designer: Patrice Vermette

Music: Johann Johannsson.

Costume designer: Renee April.

Editors: Joel Cox, Gary D. Roach.

Rated R, 153 minutes.

Jo

[jo]

variety.com/2013/film/reviews/prisoners-review-telluride-1200593140/

Telluride Film Review: ‘Prisoners’


August 30, 2013 | 07:00PM PT

Scott Foundas
Chief Film Critic@foundasonfilm
Related Stories
Film
04:49 pm

The wages of sin, guilt, vengeance and redemption weigh heavy on the characters of “Prisoners,” a spellbinding, sensationally effective thriller with a complex moral center that marks a grand-slam English-lingo debut for the gifted Quebecois director Denis Villeneuve. Powered by an unusually rich, twisty script by Aaron Guzikowski (“Contraband”) and career-best performances from Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal, this tale of two Pennsylvania families searching for their kidnapped daughters sustains an almost unbearable tension for two-and-a-half hours of screen time, satisfying as both a high-end genre exercise and a searing adult drama of the sort Hollywood almost never makes anymore. Fully deserving of mention in the same breath as “Seven,” “Mystic River” and “In the Bedroom,” this Sept. 20 Warners release may prove too intense for some viewers, but should ride strong reviews and word of mouth to above-average R-rated returns. It immediately enters the ring as an awards-season heavyweight.


Though at first glance the pic would appear to have little in common with his previous work, Villeneuve has long shown an interest in the psychological and emotional consequences of violence, as evidenced by 2009’s serenely chilling, black-and-white “Polytechnique” (about a real-life Canadian mass shooting) and especially 2010’s Oscar-nominated “Incendies,” which “Prisoners” echoes in its fragmented central mystery and its theme of the good and ill transmitted from parents to children. But in every respect, the new film finds Villeneuve working on his biggest and most ambitious canvas to date and, perhaps most impressive, flawlessly catching the moods and mores of small-town, God-fearing America.

The movie announces its measured, quietly confident tone right from the opening scene of a father-son deer-hunting trip, the first of many images of predators pursuing their prey. “Be ready,” says the father, Pennsylvania carpenter Keller Dover (Jackman), to the teenage boy (Dylan Minnette), a crucifix dangling from the rear-view mirror, a late autumn chill hanging in the air. Back at home, where Keller’s wife, Grace (Maria Bello), and 6-year-old daughter, Anna (Erin Gerasimovich), safely await his return, the basement is stocked with enough emergency provisions for a nuclear holocaust. (Among other thing, “Prisoners” is very much a movie about what people have in their basements.) All the canned goods in the world, however, cannot shield the Dovers from what is about to happen next.

Theirs is the kind of quaint suburban street where people walk over to the neighbor’s house for Thanksgiving dinner and feel relatively insulated from the world’s violent ills. Yet it is during just such a Thanksgiving that Anna wanders off unsupervised along with 7-year-old Joy, the daughter of family friends Nancy and Franklin Birch (Viola Davis and Terrence Howard, respectively). By dessert, both have vanished without a trace. The only clue: Earlier in the day, the girls were seen playing around a camper van parked in front of a vacant house down the road, the faint sound of a radio suggesting that someone was inside, patiently watching.

Det. Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) is spending his Thanksgiving alone, flirting with the waitress in a lonely Chinese diner, when he first responds to the case. In the best film-noir manner, rain is sheeting down, and the camera of the great d.p. Roger Deakins (who has shot the film in wintry blues and blacks with an expressionist edge) pushes in slowly from behind. Loki, we are told, has never failed to solve a case, though this is at odds with the man’s solemn demeanor, his haunted gaze and the elaborate tattoos jutting out from his collar suggesting reserves of private rage. Compare this to the eager-beaver murder sleuth Gyllenhaal played in David Fincher’s “Zodiac” and the full breadth of his impressive range immediately comes into focus.

The camper van is soon located along with its owner, a gangly, inarticulate man-child named Alex (played to creepy perfection by Paul Dano), who lives with his aunt (Melissa Leo) in the kind of run-down, cluttered tract house where serial killers and other movie deviants tend to reside. But awareness of such familiar tropes — and awareness of our awareness of them — is one of “Prisoners’” canny strengths. So it turns out that Alex is not the kidnapper — or at least, that there’s no physical evidence tying him to the scene — and the police are forced to let him go. Which is when Keller, who’s as sure as we are that Alex is guilty, takes matters into his own hands, abducting the suspect and chaining him up in an abandoned apartment building that belonged to his father. The movie’s tally of kidnappers now stands at two.

And the puzzle of “Prisoners” has only just begun to assemble. Following a lead to the home of an elderly priest (Len Cariou), Loki discovers a rotting corpse in a hidden cellar. Then, at exactly the one-hour mark, another shifty young man appears on the scene, triggering a whole new set of suspicions. All the while, Alex sits in hock, violently tortured and interrogated by Keller (who tells his wife he’s off helping the police) in an effort to discern the girls’ whereabouts.

With each successive revelation, Guzikowski’s brilliant script satisfies the necessary machinations while always flowing effortlessly from his vivid, multi-dimensional characters. That delicate balance extends to Villeneuve’s direction, which maintains a vise-like grip on the viewer without ever resorting to cheap shock effects or compromising the integrity of the human drama. Yet this is also a film that breathes, that knows it has the audience in its palm and can take time out for the kind of incidental, character-deepening scenes that usually end up on the cutting-room floor. In less assured hands, a movie called “Prisoners” with a plot like this would be an invitation to disaster, heavy on self-conscious allegory, symbolism and moral debate. (Everyone, don’t you see, is a prisoner of something — of time, of grief, of his own psyche.) In Villeneuve’s, nothing is belabored, the thorny questions of right and wrong bubbling under the surface without ever being declaimed.

Jackman has simply never been better than as this true believer forced to question his beliefs. Effortlessly, the Australian actor projects a solid, rugged Americanness, the acme of a man whose home is his castle and who sees himself as his family’s protector. It is a performance void of vanity or the desire to be loved by the audience, and moment to moment it is exhilarating to watch. In just a handful of scenes each, Bello and Davis suggest the full, inexpressible weight of motherly grief. Leo, given a role rife with opportunities to ham it up, instead plays things with the sober conviction of a disappointed life, another standout in a movie with nary a squandered performance in the mix.

In addition to Deakins’ stellar work, longtime Clint Eastwood editors Joel Cox and Gary Roach have done a formidable job of assembling the pic’s densely constructed narrative web. Score by Icelandic composer Johann Johannsson (also making his big-studio debut) strikes just the right haunting, mournful notes.

[Jamie]

And here's The Hollywood Reporter with more of the same: www.hollywoodreporter.com/movie/prisoners/review/618578

Jackman gives what may be the most intense and satisfying performance of his career. As the film progresses, we learn that Keller is a far more complex and tormented character than his first appearance as macho hunter suggested. A recovering alcoholic and less than perfect husband, he seems to be acting out these vigilante fantasies as a way of compensating for a deep-seated sense of inadequacy. Jackman illuminates the character’s conflicted nature without ever begging for sympathy.

[Jamie]

Kris Tapley's response to someone asking about Hugh's performance and overall film -

Kristopher Tapley ‏@kristapley 5m
Prisoners is wound about as tight as they come. Glacially paced for major tension. Too long at 158 minutes but a surprising studio thriller.:

Kristopher Tapley ‏@kristapley 40s
Jackman fantastic. Gyllenhaal solid. Villeneuve is a great formal filmmaker despite bloat in this and Incendies.

[carouselkathy]

These are great reviews from top critics! Jackman's Landing had the links as well. I always try to skip the plot outlines, so as to avoid the spoilers, but the acting reviews...Oh my!!!!!!! Can't wait!!!!

[jo]

From Kris Tapley of HitFix --

Telluride: Denis Villeneuve's 'Prisoners' is a bow of tension drawn impossibly tight

This might be Hugh Jackman's best work to date

By Kristopher Tapley Friday, Aug 30, 2013 11:47 PM





TELLURIDE, Colo. - They simply don't make thrillers like Denis Villeneuve's "Prisoners" at the studio level, and yet here it is. Glacially paced, bloated to a 158 minute running time, stingy with details as its mystery unfolds, it goes against most every convention for a film like this.

Upon introducing the film tonight after having just completed it a week ago today, Villeneuve (who paced with nervousness outside the Werner Herzog Theater prior to the screening) noted that he was terrified of transitioning to American cinema as a French Canadian filmmaker, worried he would lose his identity. He praised his producers for allowing him to maintain it, and indeed, "Prisoners" remains a vision all his own, identifiable, even.

I was no fan of "Incendies" on a story level but found the filmmaking to be formally refined. And "Prisoners" has every ounce of that class. It's a patient film, almost painful in its suspense, and as mentioned, unafraid of pushing to an arguably unnecessary length. You could feel the length of "Incendies," too, but the difference here is that drawing the bow so meticulously tight adds to the atmosphere Villeneuve is building.

The narrative, in a nutshell, was set up nicely by a trailer many think gives away too much, but trust me when I say it doesn't. It's the story of a pair of kidnapped girls and the labyrinthine hunt for where they are, who took them and why. The answers ultimately aren't all that satisfying, to be perfectly honest, but the build to them, the craft on display and a hugely brave final moment make it easy enough to look past narrative contrivances.

Of course, plenty of credit is owed to Villeneuve's crew, cinematographer Roger Deakins in particular. There's a reason most consider Deakins to be the best working DP and he makes another case here, collaborating with Villeneuve on a vision of at times startling richness, any number of frames bucking what one might expect out of a film such as this.

The ensemble is great across the board but Hugh Jackman gives what honestly might be his best performance as one of the desperate fathers willing to do whatever it takes to find his daughter. Jake Gyllenhaal is also perfectly utilized, carving out a law enforcement character caught between the robotics of the job and the emotion of the case. And also worth noting is Terrence Howard as the other father; he doesn't get a whole lot to do here, but he makes it all count and, along with his work in "Lee Daniels' The Butler," seems to be back on the right track.

I don't quite know if this shakes out as an awards movie, though, and it's not like it has to. Jackman certainly deserves to be in the Best Actor conversation but it's impossibly competitive. The film editing and cinematography both deserve consideration, too, but I can't be sure. If it takes off (the Telluride crowd here was riveted), then there could be wiggle room.

But I keep coming back to the simple note that this is atypical. It's not reinvention of the wheel, mind. It's not something completely fresh. But it is expert, tasteful craft in the Hollywood sphere. We just don't get it often enough. I think one day Villeneuve is going to give us an absolute diamond. I look forward to it, but in the meantime, this is an impressive leap onto the Hollywood stage.

"Prisoners" plays the Telluride Film Festival throughout the weekend before heading to Toronto next week. It hits theaters on Sept. 20.

Read more at www.hitfix.com/in-contention/telluride-denis-villeneuves-prisoners-is-a-bow-of-tension-drawn-impossibly-tight#T3DkBz7FOpYWIvjM.99

Kris was not overly impressed with Hugh's Valjean, because he rated Bradley Cooper, after DLewis, over Hugh Jackman in the last Oscar forecasts.

The lead in 12 YEARS A SLAVE, Chiwetel Ejiofor, gets a lot of Oscar Best Actor buzz because the role itself is compelling and has a historical perspective.

I guess what can work in Hugh's favor is more his impressive performance against type ( talking about the anti-hero nature of the role and the range of roles he has achieved as an actor) and maybe he will have a chance. If he gets a nomination again, that will put people on real notice that he is indeed a brilliant actor!

Just hoping and praying again

Jo

[jo]

This is a postscript to the Official Review of THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER --

www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/telluride-worlds-first-screening-prisoners-618623

Telluride: World's First Screening of 'Prisoners' Leaves Audience Stunned


.
Denis Villeneuve's character-intensive thriller sneak previews at the fest to overwhelming effect.


Telluride, Colo. -- Prisoners, starring Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal, screened as a sneak preview Friday at the Telluride Film Festival, and director Denis Villeneuve told the audience, "This movie was finished last Friday, and it means you are the first audience ever to see this movie. For political reasons I don't understand, this is a sneak preview, but deep in my heart this is the premiere tonight."

The thriller, which breaks the rules of genre by focusing on character and the degrading effects of violence on people's souls, played well. Even viewers who could not stand its violence agreed afterwards that it was a stunning, overpowering film. Jackman plays a father whose daughter's kidnapping, apparently by a psycho (Paul Dano), turns him into a vigilante, while cop Gyllenhaal races to find the killer and keep Jackman's character from stepping over the line of criminality. The audience was clearly deeply affected by their intense performances in the unconventional, mazelike intellectual whodunnit, and also by the topflight cast: Maria Bello as Jackman's traumatized wife, Terrence Howard and Viola Davis as their friends whose daughter was also abducted, and Melissa Leo as Dano's mother.


At a Q&A with Villeneuve and producers Kira Davis, Andrew Kosove, Broderick Johnson, and Adam Kolbrenner moderated by Leonard Maltin, Villeneuve said Jackman was hesitant to accept the violence of the role. "He asked, 'How will you do it?' I said, 'I have no idea. We'll do it together.' Sometimes you have to say the truth. Honestly, I think I brought vulnerability, fragility, a lot of sadness, too. Because the tension was in the script."

Davis said they chose Villeneuve because of "the tenderness that he could show in a scene that was so dark" in his previous film Incendies. Kosove said, "We didn't want to make a genre picture, we wanted to make a character piece."

After the screening, Kosove told The Hollywood Reporter, "At Alcon, we're known for making The Blind Side and movies about the better angels of humanity, but I think sometimes you have to explore other issues. Denis explores a dark side of humanity. It's tricky, because I think the way Hollywood deals with violence is deplorable, cartoonish, garish and ignorant. It plays a role in feeding a society that's far too violent. So we could only deal with violence in a way that shows its true horror and banality."

One horrified viewer protested, "Are there any comedies at this festival?" But Kosove said, "When people recoil from it, I'm glad, because violence is a horrible thing. If art depicted it more realistically, I think there might be less of it. The point of the movie is that violence is a cancer. You care very much about the characters, because you see how this horror envelops their hearts and turns them into monsters."

The film moves next to the Toronto Film Festival, and will be released by Warners on Sept. 20.

Now I understand why the film got an "R" rating!


Jo

[jo]

Not exactly an official review but more of a commentary on the impact of the film -- from Pete Hammond of Deadline Hollywood :


www.deadline.com/2013/08/telluride-surprise-prisoners-rocks-the-fest-and-becomes-instant-oscar-contender/

Telluride: Surprise ‘Prisoners’ Rocks The Fest And Becomes Instant Oscar Contender

By PETE HAMMOND | Saturday August 31, 2013 @ 12:27am PDTTags: Alcon, Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, Melissa Leo, Prisoners, Telluride Film Festival, Warner Bros

Hyperbole at film festivals is to be expected BUT even with direct competition from Brad Pitt and the Coen Brothers, the reaction to the first public screening Friday night anywhere of director Denis Villenueve’s thrilling and penetrating drama, Prisoners at the 40th Telluride Film Festival was completely unexpected and significant. This was a “surprise” screening (although I predicted it) and filled the 650 seat Herzog Theatre. For weeks some I spoke to thought on the basis of the trailer and more mainstream elements of the film that it was probably an unworthy commercial film that somehow snuck into the more tony environ of Telluride. Uh, no. This is a first class motion picture experience unlike any other that I, for one, have experienced in a long time. But it’s not an easy sell.

The applause was strong and early critical praise is over the moon. Pundits will have to add this Alcon production being released by Warner Bros on September 20th to the list of strong Oscar contenders this year. That is, if audiences and academy members can handle the intensity of this superbly directed and produced film that features career best performances, for sure, from Jake Gyllenhaal and Hugh Jackman (okay, I liked Les Miz too a lot), plus a brilliant supporting cast including Melissa Leo going for another supporting win, Terence Howard, the great Viola Davis, Maria Bello and Paul Dano who goes through the ringer for his art. You can easily compare this gem to critically acclaimed pictures like Zodiac, Seven, Mystic River and any number of films in the genre. Director Villeneuve doesn’t shy away from the comparisons. He says he is a great admirer of David Fincher and Clint Eastwood. In fact one of his editors, Joel Cox, is an Eastwood regular.

Look, it’s not an easy sit but as Telluride’s Julie Huntsinger had planned to say in opening remarks before she was called away, “I’m sorry, and you’re welcome”. This was sweet music to the ears of Villeneuve who was here in Telluride with edgy indie films twice before including the Oscar nominated Foreign Language film, Incendies. But this was different as he explained when we met at lunch at the Sheridan Opera House a few hours before the film’s debut screening. I had the advantage of seeing the finished digital print even before Warners and Alcon execs as it was delivered just hours before I saw the film on the WB lot alone Monday morning. Originally I was scheduled to see a rough cut of the film racing against time to be ready for Telluride and Toronto but I got lucky. I am glad I was by myself as I kept yelling things at the screen, such is the experience of this two and a half hour emotionally draining ride. It’s a total cliché but I was on the edge of my seat through the whole thing.

“Cinema is alive when people see it, otherwise it is just an object. What I love about Telluride is that it is a real audience and I am looking forward to get the reaction. I am aware that my movie is not a comedy, not a musical. It’s a dark piece and I’m looking forward to seeing how people will react, ” Villeneuve said just hours before the several debut screenings of the film this weekend. Villeneuve doing his first big studio film said he was aware of all the horror stories about the transition but was pleasantly surprised. He said he and cinematographer Roger Deakins were given carte blanche by Alcon. It was the perfect experience for them, and as someone commented Friday night, Deakins doesn’t like any of his directors. Whether that’s true or not, he certainly liked Villeneuve and vice-versa for the director who just heaped praise on his DP who is Oscar-less but not for long.

The film is obstensibly about the Thanksgiving Day kidnapping of two girls from two families spending the holiday together. But as the director explains the much-admired Aaron Guzikowski black-listed script, it is not about a kidnapping. “It’s an exploration of how violence is spreading inside a family. How it destroys the tissue inside a family. What I was really impressed with in the screenplay is the way we see the different impact of the tension and violence on the various characters. I thought the main theme of someone struggling with distrust of his own institutions and individual freedom, this kind of tension I thought was very well expressed and inspiring,” he said adding that it is a sadly contemporary subject.

I don’t think there’s a single laugh in the film, no relief. You are simply wrung out by the end. The title is appropriate. All the characters are prisoners in their own right. This is a major achievement, one I can see landing several significant Oscar nominations. The journey is just beginning for the film. Villeneuve gives much credit to the casting and his key stars. “If you cast someone like Jake Gyllenhaal, you know he will invade the part totally and create something. My background is documentary. I am used to listening to life. The more I am doing fiction movies, the more I love actors and want to give them freedom. There is nothing more exciting than to let chaos happen in front of the camera,” he said while adding he was also more impressed everyday with Jackman as well as Gyllenhaal. He said Jackman is an actor without ego...

Jo

[jo]

blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/telluride-review-prisoners-starring-hugh-jackman-jake-gyllenhaal-20130830

Telluride Review: 'Prisoners' Starring Hugh Jackman & Jake Gyllenhaal



Reviews.
by Rodrigo Perez
August 31, 2013 9:37 AM

Director Denis Villeneuve and actor Jake Gyllenhaal are on the precipice of having a tremendous fall film festival season. Arriving in just a few short days is their first collaboration, “Enemy,” a terrific psychological doppelganger thriller that will premiere next week in Toronto. But first up, the pair (along with co-lead Hugh Jackman) unleashed their first collaboration, “Prisoners,” at Telluride last night as one of the “surprise” screenings of the festival. And if this dark, intense and engrossing drama is any indication of what’s to come, it bodes very well for future collaborations.

What lengths will you go to to protect your loved ones? What boundaries will you cross? These are the questions raised in Villeneuve’s fifth feature, a brooding, visceral and emotionally bruising examination of trauma, loss, sin and deliverance. On a cold and wet Thanksgiving evening in the suburbs of Massachusetts, Keller Dover (Jackman), a loving father, hunter and be-prepared-at-all-times survivalist, and his wife (Maria Bello) have the Birches (Viola Davis, Terrence Howard) over for their annual turkey dinner. Laughs and good times are had, but in the blink of an eye, their evening goes amiss.

Suddenly, the couples’ children, who went off to play next door, are missing and nowhere to be found. As the families comb the neighborhood, collected concern grows into alarm, trembles into panic and then erupts into a fever pitch of all-out terror and desperation. One small lead, a junkheap RV seen near the scene of the would-be abduction, proves fruitful. A singularly determined loner cop, Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) arrives on the scene where he finds a panicked suspect who tries, unsuccessfully, to flee. The suspect is Alex Frost (Paul Dano), a mentally impaired invalid who swears he knows nothing of the crime, and it’s even unclear whether he understands what’s going on.

Released after 48 hours back into the arms of his concerned aunt (Melissa Leo) due to lack of evidence, Dover’s impatience, fear and frustration begins to clash with the authorities’ inability to charge the young man. His escalating worry for his daughter's life—knowing the longer they wait, the less of a chance she has—soon takes a violent turn. And then a morally disturbing and brutal form of torture and vigilantism takes hold, from which the father can never return. Far from the feel-good movie of the year, “Prisoners” is dark, disturbing, white-knuckle stuff with an unnerving shade of dread blanketed over almost every frame. Every parent’s worst nightmare, “Prisoners” connects thanks to some masterclass filmmaking in suspense, terror and intrigue. Watching the emotional toll the abductions take on the families, law enforcement and community around them is particularly brutal and affecting.




Already boasting a Foreign-Language Oscar nomination for “Incendies” and a string of strong independent features, Villeneuve continues to prove his deeply confident footing in modern day cinema, bringing intelligence and muscular and mannered nuance to a somber and extremely tense studio drama that doesn’t deign to ever spell things out (the ending is probably the most bold studio finale we’ve seen in ages and seemed to even puzzle some). His precision and control over tone, pitch and mood—much of which is gripping and portentous—is immaculate. Villeneuve knows where to place a camera for maximum effect, and when the camera chooses to move it often produces chills. The director also knows how to create an unrelenting tight tension that quivers with rapt emotion. Symbols quietly burn on the edges of alarmingly foreboding compositions, and one particular oh-so-subtle and simple camera push-in is breathlessly haunting and masterful. Top-flight above-the-liners support Villeneuve in his deeply concentrated and meticulous aims, but Oscar-nominated cinematographer Roger Deakins ("True Grit," "Skyfall") steals the show with some breathtakingly layered compositions and the disquieting atmospheres he drapes around the picture.

Jackman roars with a Wolverine-like rage and intensity in frustration at the ineffectuality of the police working his daughter’s case, but there’s an authentic, emotionally connected and anguished howl to his pain that he could never access with Logan. Like “Incendies” before it, “Prisoners” is emotionally draining as the family, the detectives and everyone involved is put through the wringer, but it’s an all-consuming ride that’s ultimately compelling, if not slightly exhausting. While Jackman is more than genuine as the father driven to the ends of his frayed tether to find his daughter—and a few particular scenes with his son are heartbreakingly emotional—it’s Gyllenhaal as the in-his-world, indefatigable detective that takes over as the heart of movie in the end with an impassioned but controlled tenacity that never asks to be applauded as heroic.

Written by Aaron Guzikowski, his script topped the Black List in 2009, and was all the rage that year, with names like Bryan Singer, Mark Wahlberg, Leonardo DiCaprio and more attached in various incarnations. And it’s easy to see why. But while taut and riveting, one of film’s minor issues is that it has so much ground to cover on the page that it threatens to unravel the movie. For its first hour and a half, “Prisoners” is top-notch, but credulity strains slightly when the labyrinthine twists of the film’s third act become a little knotty. But a rousing, heart-stopping finish plus the intensity of the material wins out in the end.

At two and a half hours, “Prisoners” is grueling and also slightly saggy at the two-thirds mark, but credit Villeneuve for knowing when to relax and then tighten the vice along the way. While some second act crime conceits deter some of the film’s momentum, it’s also crucial to the layers of this complex thriller (and personally, it’s difficult to say where one would begin if they had to shave scenes off this movie). “Prisoners” navigates tricky two-hander POV issues too. While it’s ostensibly a movie about the lengths a man will go to protect his family, the drama actually ends up seamlessly passing the baton to the resolute and emotionally invested detective who vows to solve the case and bring the families’ daughters home alive. The movie also quietly foreshadows much of this transition along the way so the hand-off isn’t jarring.

Featuring a terrific supporting cast, everyone brings their A-Game, but Bello as the destroyed mother and Davis as the matriarch who puts her faith in Dover, are especially strong. “Prisoners” is difficult, wrenching subject matter, and it will be interesting to see how audiences (and Oscar voters for that matter) respond. The picture is often graphic and pulls no punches in its disturbing violence, but its unflinching nature gives it a memorable sear that won't soon be forgotten. A first-rate thriller with a blackened bite, “Prisoners” may not be the easiest or most escapist sit for the casual moviegoer, but it’s this kind of filmmaking and storytelling that brings folks like us flocking to the theaters year after year. [B+/A-]

[jo]

www.indiewire.com/article/telluride-film-festival-review-hugh-jackman-and-jake-gyllenhaal-carry-denis-villeneuves-tense-kidnapping-drama-prisoners?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Reviews.

by Eric Kohn
August 31, 2013 7:26 PM

A first-rate ensemble procedural with weighty themes to spare, Quebecois director Denis Villeneuve's tense kidnapping drama "Prisoners" revolves around a familiar set of genre ingredients but lays them out with expert precision. Similar to Villeneuve's Oscar-nominated "Incendies," the director's first entirely English language feature involves a high stakes investigation and a generation-sprawling mystery only made fully clear in its closing scenes, but the comparisons stop there. Before all else, Villneuve's grim chronicle of the fallout when two young girls vanish in a small town succeeds at crafting one powerfully suspenseful moment after another.

Closest in terms of precedents to the patiently told crime sagas of David Fincher, with shades of "Se7en" and explicit nods to "Zodiac," "Prisoners" alternates between two modes: an investigative thriller and a intense tale of crime and punishment. From the opening shot, it's obvious that the movie intends to tackle big ideas, as Villeneuve's camera gradually pulls back from a deer in the snow to find it in the crosshairs of a teen hunter while his stern-faced father, Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) recites a prayer. The mixture of tension and spiritual convictions that come out of that sequence remain in place over the course of the next two-and-half hours, picking up steam moments later. After father and son bring home the buck, they share the meal with Keller's close friend and neighbor Franklin Birch (Terrence Howard) and his brood as holiday cheer sets in. Within minutes, the tenor of the scene shifts, as the two families' young daughters vanish without a trace and panic sets in.

Nearby, wry detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) tracks down a mobile home spotted near the neighborhood and arrests simpleton Alex Jones (Paul Dano), an obvious suspect who offers no clues to the girls' whereabouts. Having reached this juncture, "Prisoners" branches off in two directions: The continuing efforts by Loki to track down the reason behind the girls' disappearance by grasping for shreds of local events stretching back several decades, and the alarmingly risky antics of Keller as he decides to take matters into his own hands.

Frustrated with the police's inability to press charges against Dano's soft-spoken headcase, Keller kidnaps the young man and tortures him in a vacant building for days at a time, vainly performing a series of brutal acts to pry out new information. Revealing the scheme to the similarly bereaved Keller and his wife (Viola Davis), Keller drags the Birch family into his dangerous vigilante world while keeping his own brood in the dark, further complicating their ability to cope with the difficult scenario. As a result of this uneasy dynamic, there are several layers knowledge circulating throughout the thorny plot. "Prisoners" retains a constant level of engagement by making it impossible to determine who will discover the next piece of the puzzle and whether a moral boundary has been crossed.

While Gyllenhaal's character grows suspicious of Keller's behavior, both men seem to be walking circles around the bigger picture behind the original crime. Though their commitments resonate, they hail from familiar archetypes: Loki is the obsessive cop slowly driven to maniacal extremes by his interest in an impenetrable case, while Keller takes on the dimensions of a typically flawed power freak when he starts hitting the bottle to bury his sorrows. Yet there's no doubting the power of Aaron Guzikowski's script in rendering the men's plights with a series of engrossing turns. Unsurprisingly, "Prisoners" refers not only to the pair of presumed young captives but to the way everyone impacted by their absence is trapped by emotion and instinct.

It's certainly difficult to empathize with Keller once he starts subjecting his own detainee to severe measures, threatening him with a hammer and hot water to no avail. "He's not a person anymore," he claims to his horrified friend, inadvertently establishing the possibility that the description could fit Keller just as well.

Villneuve does a fine job establishing these alternating incidents, although the rest of the cast is noticeably less rounded, a sore point particularly in relation to the underwritten female characters: Maria Bello, as Jackman's melancholic wife, does little more than wander around her house and weep, while Davis gets only one scene to show much of a personality. By contrast, Melissa Leo stands out with a substantially intriguing role as the mother to Dano's enigmatic character, with her significance in the story expanding in definition as the plot moves along, though she's also a somewhat distracting cartoonish archetype of white trash that leads "Prisoners" in a pulpy direction that's beneath its grand gestures.

Nevertheless, it's easy to make peace with some of the obvious genre tropes and simply admire the precision with which Villneuve keeps the pace in constant forward motion. As with Fincher's "Zodiac," the nature of the search for answers takes on an almost metaphysical quality divorced from specifics. Of course, the movie also contains a literal connection to Fincher's movie in form of Gyllenhaal, who does some of finest, most controlled work since his similar role there. Jackman's equally in top form, channeling the rage that made him such a fine Wolverine into a concerned parent driven to irrational outbursts.

The specifics of the investigation can't compete with the maturity of the storytelling, and when various pieces start to come together in the final hour, the movie's dramatic contrivances grow somewhat distractingly obvious. However, Villeneuve finds steady footing in finale, when the pileup of circumstances give way to a subtler, ambiguous conclusion. Villeneuve makes the philosophical conundrums lurking beneath the proceedings feel purposeful. "You can't always save the day," a minor character argues to the resolute detective. With a perceptive eye, "Prisoners" showcases the struggle to push back against that sentiment without taking sides.

Criticwire grade: B+

HOW WILL IT PLAY? Warner Bros. releases "Prisoners" on September 20. Well-received at Telluride, the movie should gain some awards season momentum for its lead performances and screenplay, although the dark subject matter make it a tough box office proposition.

[jo]

Another one from a film site --

8.5 of 10

www.firstshowing.net/2013/telluride-2013-denis-villeneuves-prisoners-is-chilling-enthralling/

TELLURIDE FILM FEST


Telluride 2013: Denis Villeneuve's 'Prisoners' is Chilling & Enthralling

by Alex Billington
September 2, 2013


A new crime thriller in the pantheon of acclaimed favorites like Zodiac, Se7en and even Silence of the Lambs has arrived. And it's surprisingly as great as those films. It has been a few years since Aaron Guzikowski's kidnapping screenplay Prisoners earned a top spot on the industry Black List. After changing different director's hands for years in development, French-Canadian filmmaker Denis Villeneuve (of Incendies) got the job to bring the story to life and has delivered a very chilling, Fincher-esque, visually sleek mystery-suspense-thriller. Boasting one hell of an ensemble cast, and running over two hours long, the riveting plot in Prisoners deserves the adjective brilliant for all the twists and turns that lead lead to the final moment.

Prisoners tells the story of two families that experience a harrowing kidnapping. On a quiet Thanksgiving afternoon, their two young daughters suddenly disappear. They are nowhere to be found without any hints of struggle. With the ticking clock activated, the mothers (played by Maria Bello and Viola Davis) lose control of all their emotions and breakdown, while the fathers (played by Hugh Jackman and Terrence Howard) begin searching on their own. Local police detective Loki (played by Jake Gyllenhaal) takes on the case and the plot suddenly shifts to his perspective, following him closely as he tries to put together what little clues there are, find the girls alive and safe, all without the parents' desperation getting out of control.

There are subtle clues hidden throughout, but on the first viewing, most moviegoers won't pick up on all the details even though they're there. While a running time of almost 160 minutes seems daunting, Villeneuve carefully weaves a gripping narrative that won't have you once looking at your watch or wondering how far along it is. Which is an impressive feat considering he cuts out a large amount of the procedural details and moments of grief (scenes which have already been explored in countless other movies before) leaving just the captivating "who took them and where are they being kept?" mystery as the most important part of the experience. But that's only the beginning in terms of the brilliance of this script and what it's examining.

Without saying too much, Prisoners becomes an interesting self-reflective lesson in violence and our overly-reactive human nature. It's both painful and oddly invigorating to watch one man hunt down and torture the person he believes responsible for kidnapping his daughter. He has enough clues, or so he thinks, even if the police don't believe them, and that's all one person needs to cross their own moral boundaries just to get an answer. The screenplay explores those moral boundaries and the way we all misread and confuse situations and other people, even when we shouldn't. I was consistently impressed by every new twist and suspenseful turn in the plot, and was completely lost in the story unable to even process what happened until it ended.

Special commendation needs to be given to cinematographer Roger Deakins, who drives the story and the mystery with some of his shots, pushes, zooms and pans (along with Jóhann Jóhannsson's score). There's a few car chase scenes, one in particular in the second half, on snowy roads in rural Pennsylvania that are as thrilling as big action scenes in summer blockbusters. That's not to say this movie is too glossy or too sleek, but his camera work enhances the experience to such a drastic degree it just wouldn't be the same without his stellar cinematography. Deakins will get even more awards acclaim for this, there's no doubt about that.

For no real reason, I wasn't expecting too much going into this, but I am happy to report that it's actually an outstanding film. It is by no means flawless and while the Zodiac comparisons are apt, it's not particularly as detailed and engrossing as David Fincher's serial killer film. That said, this is no throwaway thriller, it's a brilliant mystery that will be remembered. More than anything, the movie succeeds thanks to Villeneuve's excellent direction of Guzikowski's script, and a cast that really gives it their all. Prisoners is a great exercise in telling a compelling story that runs two hours and yet keeps viewers enthralled up until the final second.

Alex's Telluride Rating: 8.5 out of 10
Follow Alex on Twitter - @firstshowing

[jo]

Another unabashed rave review -- 10 out of 10 -- from JoBlo.com!!


www.joblo.com/movie-news/review-prisoners-tiff-2013

Movie News
Review: Prisoners (TIFF 2013)
Sep. 5, 2013by: Chris Bumbray



PLOT: A rural New England community is shaken to the core by the abduction of two six-year-old girls. When the key suspect in the abduction is let go by the police due to a lack of evidence, the father of one of the girls, Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) takes the law into his own hands.

REVIEW: If all you know about Denis Villeneuve's PRISONERS is based on the trailers, you don't know much about it at all. Don't worry though, that's just the way it should be. Having just played to rave reviews at Telluride, and all but sure to do the same thing at TIFF, you'll be reading and hearing lots and lots about the film between now and it's general release on September 20th. And when the public gets to see it opening day, wow, just you wait. This will be THE water-cooler movie of the fall, and the one everyone's going to have an opinion about.

I was lucky in that I got to see it knowing very little about the film other than that which I got from the first preview, which, I must say was rather ingeniously done as it gives away virtually nothing that happens outside the first forty minutes of the lengthy two and a half hour running time. Rest assured, I'm not going to be the jerk that spoils the movie, so if this review comes off a little vague, it's only to avoid ruining any of the film's surprises, which kept me on the edge of my seat through the entire running time.

In fact, as soon as I walked out of PRISONERS, I emailed my editor here to tell him “PRISONERS makes SE7EN look like BLAZING SADDLES.” I don't mean that PRISONERS is as violent as Fincher's masterpiece, but it's similarly disturbing, perhaps even more so in that it's a film about adults hurting children, which is without a doubt the most heinous crime imaginable. In fact, PRISONERS isn't terribly gruesome, but on an emotional level it's nothing short of devastating. When it was over, I felt like going somewhere to cry for half an hour, as that's how drained I was by it's power. It exposes us to an evil that's terrifying simply due to the fact that it's so real.

With PRISONERS, Denis Villeneuve certainly establishes himself as one of our major filmmakers, and he'll no doubt be rocketing to the top of the A-list, regardless of whether or not this makes a dime (although many people are predicting this is going be an Oscar contender, which it most certainly deserves to be). If you've seen INCENDIES, Villeneuve's Oscar-nominated Quebecois movie from a few years ago, you'll know this guy is already a master, and truly, PRISONERS is the work of a genius. It should be said, he's helped immeasurably by the brilliant script by Aaron Guzikowski, which for once is a black list winner that lives up to the hype. The cinematography by the great Roger Deakins also gives this a striking look, with it initially boasting a reserved colour palette, only to get more and more explosive as the film goes on.

However, as good a job as Villeneuve did, I wasn't surprised that he delivered a hell of a film. I expect that from him. What really threw me for a loop were the performances. Everyone loves Hugh Jackman. He's personable, handsome, can sing, dance, act, do action, etc. But, Jackman has never had a role that's pushed him to the brink like this one has. His Keller Dover is a fascinating character. On the surface, he seems like some kind of bible-thumping cliche, with the first scene showing him teaching his son to hunt, before showing us his survival gear-filled cellar, and listening to him pray. But, Jackman doesn't play Dover like a fanatic. Yes, he's religious, and probably more than a little paranoid. But, he's also a doting dad, a loving husband, and a great friend to the sophisticated family next door (headed by Terrence Howard and Viola Davis- both of whom are at their best) who like him enough to invite him and his family to spend Thanksgiving with them.

Once the girls are kidnapped, Jackman's character eventually gets so primal and boiling with rage that he makes Wolverine look milquetoast by comparison. There's a scene where Jackman offhandedly smashes a sink to bits with a hammer, just by bringing it down a little too hard that will make you gasp. Jackman's like a caged animal, and his fury, while justified, is terrifying in it's intensity.

As the second lead, Jake Gyllenhaal makes an interesting contrast. A young cop with a chip on his shoulder, Gyllenhaal is everything Jackman's not in this, from the tattoos on his neck and fingers, to his often cool, but compassionate demeanour. Between this and END OF WATCH, Gyllenhaal's starting to excel at playing cops, and while he initially takes a back seat to Jackman (who's clearly relishing the role of his life), he ends up giving a performance that's just as gripping as Jackman's.

The same goes for Paul Dano, as the mentally challenged prime suspect, and Melissa Leo as his guardian. Both subvert the audience's expectations at every turn, as neither plays the kind of stock character you'd expect from a film like this. Dano often has a tendency to go big in his performances, but here he plays his character strikingly quiet, making him difficult to read, and even sympathetic. Leo's performance was even more difficult to grasp, with her motivations never being clear until they absolutely have to be.

I really can't praise PRISONERS highly enough, as to me it feels like some kind of masterpiece. It's without a doubt the best movie I've seen this year, and I'd be gobsmacked if anything else plays at TIFF (or heck, even comes out this year) that measures up to it. To me, the ultimate key to a movie's success is how much of an effect it had on me emotionally. This one left me a wreck, and will likely do the same to even the most jaded viewer.

10 out of 10

[jo]

From ScreenCrush - a little bit cynical but still a 7 of 10 review --

screencrush.com/prisoners-review/

Prisoners’ Review

by Jordan HoffmanSeptember 5, 2013 7:39 AM

Here’s a tip. If you don’t want people to think you are a child molester, pick out different frames than the ones Paul Dano wears in ‘Prisoners.’

When neither Jake Gyllenhaal (as Detective Loki – yeah, you read that right) or his CSI crew can find any evidence that suspected molester Dano abducted two little girls that went for an unsupervised walk through a Pennsylvania suburb after Thanksgiving dinner, it’s up to one of the two fathers of the girls – Hugh Jackman – to take matters into his own hand…

While his wife (Maria Bello) zonks out on tranquilizers, Jackman captures the emotionally stunted (But evil! Probably!) young man and takes him to a dilapidated property he owns. He then commits to a plan to beat the hell out of Dano until he gets the information he needs.

Equally upset, but less willing to torture a man the cops say is innocent, is the other father, Terrence Howard. But Jackman is able to convince him at first, because his character exudes old school American manliness. He believes in God, he likes Bruce Springsteen, he keeps a basement full of canned goods in case of emergency and he takes his son hunting.

All that preparedness doesn’t help him, though, when a the hand of fate comes down and snatches his daughter. And while ‘Prisoners’ is very much a film with two leads (Jackman and Gyllenhaal) the first half of the film really works as a disturbing portrait of a man refusing the facts in front of him – and how this refusal changes him.

The ‘Prisoners’ script, written by Aaron Guzikowski (who also wrote the Mark Wahlberg vehicle ‘Contraband’) does a lot of things right. Its elliptical portrait of Gyllenhaal, the detective who always gets his man, is top notch. There are quick references to a troubled childhood in group homes, oddly placed tattoos and a not-too-overdone facial tick. From the inertia of a thousand cop movies you get that he is a troubled, dedicated soul – this movie feels no need to get too specific about it.

As such, the moments between a desperate Jackman and by-the-book (but crying-on-the-inside) Gyllenhall are outstanding. They speak at one another, not to each other, and this is amplified by director Dennis Villenueve’s (‘Incendies’) knack for either holding shots or cutting away as dialogue plays on the soundtrack – often to a tangentially related montage.

These niceties, as well as the work of the justly lionized cinematographer Roger Deakins, are more than enough to elevate ‘Prisoners’ from the standard detective story. The recent Nicolas Cage/John Cusack dud ‘The Frozen Ground’ shares some similar plot points (as well as bad weather) but further emphasizes just how much ‘Prisoners’ gets right.

Still, by the third act, when a fairly absurd conspiracy plot is revealed, a lot of the good will this movie earns gets spent. I still had my stomach in knots about getting those two little girls home, but the realism and dread from the opening transformed into fairly typical white hat vs. black hat tropes. It’s not that the story doesn’t make sense (a nice post-screening conversation with a fellow audience member may be needed to connect all the dots) it’s just that, well, it’s kinda far-fetched.

‘Prisoners’ is too nuanced to dismiss, but too silly to take seriously. To me, it’s a tiny bit of a let down considering that a more straightforward – and daring – psychological examination was so close to its grasp. might have been. Still, a solid, adult movie with big stars from a major studio is such a rarity that perhaps we shouldn’t get too greedy.

7 out of 10

[jo]

From Screen International --

Prisoners

5 September, 2013 | By John Hazelton

Dir: Denis Villeneuve. US. 2013. 151mins


An impressive US debut for French-Canadian director Denis Villeneuve, dramatic thriller Prisoners is a potent mix of suspense, emotion and intrigue that draws intense performances from leads Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal. Though disturbing subject matter and a very dark tone will certainly be limiting factors at the box office, festival exposure and possible awards season attention should still allow this expertly crafted Alcon production to find an upmarket adult audience.


Villeneuve lets the tension build slowly and organically, using most of his screen time to look at how the relationships change as the clock ticks on the search for the missing girls.

After its surprise premiere last week at Telluride, the film screens this week at the Toronto festival, helping build momentum for a wide North American release through Warner Bros on September 20. A screening at San Sebastian will precede a Sept/Oct global rollout during which Jackman’s international success with Les Miserables and The Wolverine will give distributors - Warner in a few territories, independents elsewhere - additional marketing leverage.

The one-time Black List script by Aaron Guzikowski (whose other credits include Contraband) introduces Jackman’s blue-collar family man Keller Dover just before his six-year-old daughter and another little girl are abducted from their Pennsylvania suburb. Gyllenhaal’s Detective Loki starts investigating the case, but not to the satisfaction of Keller, who is quickly convinced that local man-child Alex (There Will Be Blood’s Paul Dano) knows what happened.

Villeneuve - best known up to now for Oscar-nominated foreign language drama Incendies - lets the tension build slowly and organically, using most of his screen time to look at how the relationships – between Keller, Loki, Alex, Keller’s wife (played by Mario Bello), the other child’s parents (Terrence Howard and The Help’s Viola Davis) and Alex’s mother (Melissa Leo) – change as the clock ticks on the search for the missing girls.

The mood of foreboding is enhanced by the film’s muted colour palette and cinematographer Roger Deakins’ use of digital cameras and natural light.

In the final hour of its two-and-a-half hour running time, the film is more about shocks (including a couple of gruesomely violent scenes) and plot twists. The twists don’t always make complete sense and occasionally feel gratuitous - but they do keep the suspense going until the very final frame.

[jo]

Not yet a full review, but CINEMABLEND provides a detailed perspective of the movie --

www.cinemablend.com/new/Hugh-Jackman-Gives-Career-Best-Performance-Toronto-Film-Festival-Premiering-Prisoners-39296.html

Hugh Jackman Gives A Career-Best Performance In Toronto Film Festival-Premiering Prisoners


Author: Sean O'Connell| published: 2013-09-05 08:29:27

Sean is spending the next week in the Great White North at this year's Toronto International Film Festival, where a ton of the fall's biggest movies are premiering. Follow along with his coverage Here

You haven’t experienced a true pit in the bottom of your stomach until you have lost your child. And I’m not even talking in extremes. When our oldest son was five, I lost sight of him in a crowded department store. Maybe 30 seconds passed before he resurfaced. It felt like months. Horrible thoughts flooded by brain in that split second. I felt true fear, perhaps for the first time in my life.


Director Denis Villeneuve (Incendies) masterfully stretches that disquieting dread over the duration of his latest film, Prisoners, an intense and relentless missing-child thriller set in a rain-soaked, small-town Pennsylvania suburb. On Thanksgiving, neighbors Anna Dover (Erin Gerasimovich) and Joy Birch (Kyla Drew Simmons) leave their family gathering as they search for Anna’s red whistle. By time the distracted parents -- Keller (Hugh Jackman), Grace (Maria Bello), Franklin (Terrence Howard) and Nancy (Viola Davis) – notice the girls aren’t around, the pair already has been abducted.

Initially, there’s a suspect. The girls were spotted playing near the camper of quiet, introverted Alex Jones (Paul Dano). But thorough questioning by Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) reveals Jones’ secret” He has the intellect of a 10-year-old, and couldn’t possibly be responsible for the girls’ disappearance … despite the subtle hints the young man gives to Keller which suggest he knows something.

A meaty hook waiting at the heart of Prisoners can be seen in the trailers, but I want to give you the opportunity to backpedal now before we get too deep into discussion on the film. Those curious should understand that it is a formidable exercise, a meat-and-potatoes police procedural that’s seasoned by Jackman’s career-best, Oscar-worthy performance and exquisite camera work by the great Roger Deakins. There’s a deliberate sheen to Prisoners that suggests the entire production resides in an exit-less Purgatory. I’m confident this was Villeneuve’s intention.

The director laces blatant Catholic symbolism throughout Prisoners, which instantly adds dimension to the brutal actions that will follow. You see, Keller isn’t convinced of Alex’s innocence. And so, one evening, he waits outside the young man’s home and kidnaps him, in return. Keller imprisons Alex in an abandoned apartment, and tries to make him talk. And tries. And tries. And keeps trying, long after those of us with weaker wills (and weaker stomachs) would have stopped.

Meanwhile, Loki continues to investigate leads, as the case takes gradual twists. Prisoners lives up to buzz that it's a companion piece to David Fincher’s mesmerizing Zodiac, in somber mood and deliberate pace. Villeneuve sets Prisoners on simmer, and waits for his plot to heat up. As with any slow-boiling pot, bubbles of tension do rise to the surface. The cast, across the board, is on point – with Jackman, Gyllenhaal and Melissa Leo (in a crucial role) going above and beyond to expose the raw nerves in this piece. But Prisoners doesn’t lure you to the edge of your seat. It pushes you back, deep into your chair, where you’ll watch in horror as seemingly innocent people do despicable things, and hope their souls won’t be too tarnished because they’re operating in time of crisis.

In that way, Prisoners works best as a litmus test. Columns will be penned, and conversations will be had, about who is right and who is wrong in the film. How far would you push if it were your child that was missing? Is Jackman stooping to an animalistic level by brutally torturing Dano’s character for precious information? Or is he doing what’s necessary to save the life of his little girl? On a spiritual level, how can the God Jackman’s character regularly prays to allow such horrible deeds to happen? And are the last 30 seconds of the film a debilitating cop out?

Easy answers are hard to come by, but that ambiguity elevates Prisoners to a place most other genre exercises rarely achieve … or even aspire.

Look for our full review of Prisoners closer to its release date of September 20. In the meantime you can also check out the trailer below.

[jo]

A lady critic from FILM SCHOOL REJECTS praises Jake and cinematographer Deakins but thinks less of Hugh's acting smiley-rolleyes010


www.filmschoolrejects.com/film-festivals/prisoners-review.php

[jo]

A Rotten Tomatoes Top Critic rates the movie at 8.4 of 10 ( similarly, he rates Oscar frontrunner 12 YEARS A SLAVE only slightly higher at 8.6 -- not bad for Prisoners!) --

www.film.com/movies/prisoners-review

TIFF Review: ‘Prisoners’

William Goss September 5, 2013

8.4

"The climax is a corker, and the final shot is even better."

“Be ready,” Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) advises his son as they return from a Thanksgiving morning deer hunt. His own father said the same to him, and the God-fearing Keller has followed it to a T since. However, all the emergency supplies in the basement fail to prepare Keller or wife Grace (Maria Bello) for the abduction of their daughter and the equally young daughter of Franklin and Nancy Birch (Terrence Howard and Viola Davis) from somewhere between their respective homes in suburban Pennsylvania. The only lead left for Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) to pursue is the nearby appearance of a shady RV, driven by simple-minded local Alex Jones (Paul Dano). Without a lick of physical evidence, Loki finds himself unable to hold Alex in custody, and so a distraught Keller decides to take matters into his own hands.

If you’ve already seen the trailers for “Prisoners,” then you probably have a fair idea of where things go from here, but you may not anticipate the precise control that both director Denis Villeneuve (“Incendies”) and writer Aaron Guzikowski (“Contraband”) bring to a potentially routine procedural. Few modern thrillers aim to engage an adult audience first and foremost, and fewer still concern themselves with weighty moral dilemmas while unfolding their mysteries at a deliberate pace (the film runs nearly 150 minutes and hardly feels as such). Even if “Prisoners” doesn’t pack quite the same punch as either Ben Affleck’s great “Gone Baby Gone” or upcoming Israeli import “Big Bad Wolves,” it certainly follows well enough in their bleak, taut footsteps.

The title, of course, harbors many interpretations: the literally trapped girls and suspects, Keller’s inability to protect his kin, Loki’s frustration with a dead-end case (he’s cracked every other one to date), the wives stricken by grief (a touch that all but sidelines Bello and Davis). All of this angst is complemented well by Jóhann Jóhannsson’s foreboding score and captured starkly by Roger Deakins’ cinematography, itself casting a worthy winter’s chill over the proceedings as each character is pushed to physical and emotional extremes. Jackman and Gyllenhaal serve as two sides of the same coin, with the former delivering a positively feral performance while the latter conveys the more oppressed frustrations of being hamstrung by due process and dwindling clues. Although Dano often seems to be serving up a variation on the same sniveling performance, his work as Alex walks a fine line between a general guilelessness and more sinister gestures, with his aunt (an aged-up Melissa Leo) serving as his sole defender.

Villeneuve and Guzikowski aren’t necessarily immune to every crime-thriller convention: the requisite red herring is immediately transparent, while some breathless exposition in the second act is needed to thrust us into the home stretch. Still, rarely a moment is ever wasted, a consequence ignored, and though the climax is a corker, the final shot is even better. “Prisoners” requires and rewards your attention in equal measure. Be ready.

SCORE: 8.4 / 10

[jo]

Prisoners Review [TIFF 2013]


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Reviewed by: Sam Woolf
Rating: 4 of 5


On September 5, 2013

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Summary:


The ultimate answer to the mystery might not hold up 100% under cross-examination, and occasional feints towards exploitation will ruffle some feathers, but with a look and a cast this good, who cares whodunit?


Looking to capitalize on home ice advantage even before the Toronto International Film Festival has properly begun, Canadian director Denis Villeneuve throws down the gauntlet early with his twisty, and morbid Prisoners. While a more approachable genre effort than some of the biographical, experimental, and extraterrestrial offerings using TIFF as stumping ground zero for their long campaigns to awards season, Prisoners proves that Villeneuve won’t go quietly into the Hollywood machinery. While a tad more histrionic, and not quite as, well, incendiary as the stellar gutpunch that was 2010’s Incendies, Villeneuve has crafted an excellent crime thriller with Prisoners, one that very easily could have turned out otherwise.

Ditching his Parisian cravats, and muttonchops for a crucifix, and heavy stubble, Hugh Jackman co-stars as Keller Dover, a working class Pennsylvanian father who’s need for disaster preparation makes most survivalists look like boy scouts. “It gets to a point where the only thing standing between you and another person is you,” he tells his son (Dylan Minnette), who’s old enough to shoot a deer, but not go into the house basement that’s been stocked to the ceiling with propane, gas masks and Crisco. Though Keller has prepared for the worst natural disasters imaginable, the random and unthinkable abduction of his six year-old daughter, along with a neighbor’s child her age, provokes a volcanic anger in the man in desperate need of an outlet.

Too humble and distraught to be content with simply cursing the heavens, Keller’s impotent rage over the thin breadcrumb trail of evidence leads him to Alex (Paul Dano), a suspicious, but soft-in-the-head young man whose dilapidated RV, and oversized glasses scream probable cause. Convinced of Alex’s guilt, Keller quickly falls down a pit of moral failing in pursuit of his daughter’s whereabouts, as rapidly the turning fall weather darkens hope for the investigation with each passing day. While the slightest hints of an accent slip out during his more forceful moments, and he’s been cursed with a naturally melodious set of pipes, Jackman gives a captivating, committed performance, managing to tap into a sometimes protective, sometimes frightening fury that would cow Wolverine.

Counterbalancing him is Jake Gyllenhaal as lead detective Loki, a spiritual and cultural mutt, raised in a catholic boarding house with a Nordic surname, grown into a man who sports cross tattoos, freemason rings, and has a passing interest in zodiac signs. The last detail is big enough a nod to his career-best performance in David Fincher’s Zodiac, but shades of Robert Graysmith can be seen in Gyllenhaal’s work as Loki. While too aggressive and dogged to be mistaken for a boy scout himself, Loki’s methodical approach to the investigation only fuels Keller’s frustration. Despite the grimness of the subject matter, there’s a comical element to seeing Loki deflect the demands of the Dover family with the sorts of calming platitudes and reassurances you might yourself experience when dialling an IT call center in a rage.

Gyllenhaal’s performance isn’t as large as Jackman’s, relying mostly on facial ticks and strategic cursing, whereas Keller has the theatrical benefit of being set to explode at any moment. But the two have plenty of places to bounce off of besides one another; Terrence Howard and Viola Davis manage to suck the marrow out of not particularly meaty parts as the parents of the other abducted child, while Melissa Leo plays against type as Alex’s doting aunt. Dano is a divisive actor in some circles, and his quietly reserved work here likely won’t sway detractors, though Alex’s journey through the story might delight those same people.

Scripter Aaron Guzikowski is establishing himself as an efficient (at times bluntly so) writer of crime fiction that plays exactly as well as the effort that goes into producing it. Solid acting and direction made Contraband one of the “hey, it’s surprisingly okay!” hits of 2012, but the upgrades in front of, and behind the camera for Prisoners is dramatic. They also all but save the film the more the story dives into B-grade psychological tropes. There are some decidedly ghoulish turns during the third act, in which the Lehane-style procedural elements of something like Gone Baby Gone give way to more macabre setpieces and implications. For the most part, it’s the sturdiness of the performers that anchors the emotion, even as the plot runs overlong, and into vague explanations of its own mechanics.

Eagle-eyed viewers will grow restless as the characters puzzle over clues that seem skull-thuddingly obvious when seeing both Keller and Loki’s sides of things, yet the audience’s ability to parse out the mystery is almost entirely thanks to Villeneuve, who elevates the material more than anyone. To put it one way: it takes a fair bit of skill to open your film with a voiced over reading of the Lord’s Prayer, and frame it in a manner that’s unsettling, instead of just pretentious. Villeneuve’s vicelike grip on the camera is the sort of thing most actors would kill for, with faces and emotions dominating throughout, but his talents extend beyond just working with people. Roger Deakins is likely to see another nomination come his way for cinematography, as between his work and Villeneuve’s, the inner world of a non-descript Pennsylvania town makes for some of the most arresting imagery all year.

Even when the story starts to slip its straightjacket, Villeneuve’s staid direction keeps things grounded, and tense. Just when you think the convenient blocking posed by a bathroom sink is keeping you safe, Villeneuve reels back the ceramic curtain, and you respond in kind. Finding out the somewhat ridiculous contents of a dozen locked containers doesn’t mitigate how unsettling it is to see them laid out like coffins for the first time, and the use of a minimalist soundtrack is never more appreciated than during a pair of home invasion sequences that will get your heart rate up. Even something so familiar as a car racing through traffic in the pouring rain becomes part of a rousing climax when Villeneuve is at the wheel, masterfully combining pulp and pathos to great effect through most of a two and a half hour running time.

Prisoners isn’t bringing much new to the tradition of crime thrillers and missing children horror stories, but it does speak mightily to how quality of craft separates an airplane page-turner from a minor triumph of pulp poetry.

The ultimate answer to the mystery might not hold up 100% under cross-examination, and occasional feints towards exploitation will ruffle some feathers, but with a look and a cast this good, who cares whodunit?


4 of 5

Rating

[jo]

This UK critic from The Telegraph sent "rain" on Prisoners' "parade"!

2 out of 5/ 40%

www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/toronto-film-festival/10292256/Prisoners-Toronto-Film-Festival-review.html

Prisoners, Toronto Film Festival, review
Denis Villeneuve's mess of a movie lines up some meaty conflicts then fails to follow them through, argues Tim Robey.

2 out of 5

Dir: Denis Villeneuve. Stars: Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, Maria Bello, Terrence Howard, Viola Davis.

The trailer for Prisoners makes it out to be heavy-duty, thriller-drama awards bait – Mystic River goes to suburban Pennsylvania, if you will, with Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal donning super-intense serious-faces. This seems a misleading promotional strategy once you’ve actually seen the movie, which spins an against-the-clock search for two missing pre-teen girls into ever wackier, less reputable orbits. The film is both better than you might imagine – in a doolally sort of way – and more trivial, for all its smog-like aura of utter, unremitting despair.

The director, Denis Villeneuve, had an art-house hit with the Oscar-nominated Incendies (2010), which I’ll confess I found hideously manipulative and overrated. Many of those willing to extend him the benefit of the doubt in that calculated downer may struggle to make the same allowances here, as the script, by Aaron Guzikowski (Contraband), lines up some meaty moral conflicts without the integrity or wherewithal to follow them through.

Jackman and Maria Bello play one pair of desperate parents, Terrence Howard and Viola Davis the other – one of the movie's major disappointments is how little both of these cracking actresses get to do, though both make hay with the few significant moments dispensed. Their daughters are playmates who step out one Thanksgiving and don’t come back: enter a tattooed, twitchy Gyllenhaal as a maverick cop who’s never lost a case. He gets straight down to business by arresting a weirdo RV driver (Paul Dano) seen loitering suspiciously on the relevant street, but the lack of physical evidence encourages Jackman’s hot-headed carpenter to take the law into his own hands.

For a grim stretch in the middle, it looks as if Villeneuve and Guzikowski are intending the vigilante kidnapping of Dano’s character, and his torture by jackhammer and scalding showers, to serve as a figurative study of illegal detention and extreme interrogation methods applied to any American foe. The guilt or innocence of this damaged man-child is still up for dispute, but Jackman, with the queasy help of his neighbours, fastens on him as the only hope to get their girls back, and ties him up in one corner of a derelict parental house where no one will look. The level of debate is crude at best – it consists of a soulful Howard complaining “It’s not right!” a few times, while Jackman rises to a frenzy of vituperative frustration, losing sight of the bigger picture as he slams in another punch.



What’s unconvincing is how cagily the movie retreats backwards out of this alley, relying on blind happenstance to unearth the necessary clues, as if it doesn’t want to repeat that Zero Dark Thirty error of implying that torture gets results. This leaves it broken-backed as either rough-justice tract or police procedural, since Gyllenhaal’s Detective Loki is hardly doing sparkling honour to his badge – a late-in-the-movie mishap in the interrogation room would surely get him fired, and his deductions rarely go anywhere useful. The last, convoluted hour is an Emmental of plot holes and practically random thriller signifiers – cases of snakes, child mannequins, scribbled maps of insoluble mazes. You wonder if the whole torture-based morality play idea struck everyone as commercially dubious, and the decision was made to go for broke.

Flexing some of that Jean Valjean resolve, but with a payload of untrammelled, Wolverine-like rage behind it, Jackman comes closest to shouldering the movie, without ever seriously threatening to make it work. Still, he makes a better fist of his role than Gyllenhaal, in his second consecutive vehicle for Villeneuve after the doppelgänger drama Enemy, which is also playing in Toronto this year. Loki is a collection of fussy tics in search of a personality, but even he feels thoughtfully drawn next to Dano’s lanky, sweating stooge and an almost choicely cartoonish Melissa Leo, essentially cast in the Melissa Leo role as every suspected child molester’s favourite shabby auntie. Aged up with a prim grey wig and glasses that look as if they were purchased in the late Seventies, she gives this absurd part more welly than it’s worth, entering a previously unguessed realm of looney-tunes theatrics.

[jo]

On the other hand, another UK paper, THE GUARDIAN, rates PRISONERS 4 out of 5 stars!


www.theguardian.com/film/2013/sep/06/prisoners-hugh-jackman-toronto-2013-review

Prisoners: Toronto 2013 – first look review

French-Canadian director Denis Villeneuve has made an English language thriller both gripping and mysterious

4 of 5 stars

Paul MacInnes

theguardian.com, Friday 6 September 2013 17.48 BST

In his first English language film, Quebeçois director Denis Villeneuve has produced a masterful thriller that is also an engrossing study of a smalltown America battered by recession, fear and the unrelenting elements.


A hulking Hugh Jackman leads a powerful ensemble cast as Keller Dover, a carpenter whose daughter goes missing on a stormy Thanksgiving afternoon. Suspicions immediately fall on local loner Alex Jones (Paul Dano) whose rusting RV is spotted at the scene of the disappearance. Jones is detained but remains mute during questioning. When he is released, Dover seeks to take the law into his own hands.

Jackman's Dover is a study in intensity, his brow tightly furrowed throughout. He is a family man and patriot, but also a recovering alcoholic and survivalist whose basement resembles a nuclear bunker. We start the movie trusting that Dover is the hero but are made to question our allegiances throughout. By the end he is questioning his trust in himself.

The increasingly abhorrent actions of a desperate father are contrasted with those of local police inspector Loki, a brilliant Jake Gyllenhaal. Another character with two conflicting sides, he is the town's detective supreme, one who has never failed to bring home a case and adheres strictly to the principles of policework. At the same time, his features are permanently haunted, with big black rings around his eyes. He has a nervous tic and scratchy home-made tattoos. We are never told why. The contrast between Loki and Dover, the gap between what they stand for and what they are willing to do, provide a gripping moral tension at the heart of the film.

There are more strong performances, from Dano as Jones, from Maria Bello as Dover's wife Grace and from Melissa Leo as Jones's mother, a woman whose tiny frame contrasts belies a flinty resolve.

Villeneuve's thriller relies less on excitement through unexpected twists than by building a consistent feeling of dread at the pit of the stomach. When a new suspect appears suddenly at a candlelit vigil you are initially reminded of Kevin Spacey's entrance in Seven. The suspect quickly disappears again. Prisoners stands up to comparisons with other memorable thrillers of recent years however and in its slow, sombre, unspoken tone is reminiscent of another David Fincher film, Zodiac.

This feeling is enhanced by Roger Deakin's cinematography. It lingers throughout focussing on abandoned lots, stained clapboard houses and stair rods of rain. The palette is earthen brown and stony grey enlivened only by the pulsating green of the woodland that feels almost ready to reclaim this embattled town.

There is a feeling of a community clinging on by its fingertips, not just in coming to terms with a terrible crime but in making ends meet at all. This is perhaps Villeneuve's greatest achievement. Without having his cast say a word about the "state of things" it offers a portrait of a place that is drained of hope and optimism, full of fear and suspicion. When the mystery is finally solved, we are not left any more encouraged by the resolution.

[Jamie]

Sept 6, 2013 18:44:01 GMT -5 jo said:

This UK critic from The Telegraph sent "rain" on Prisoners' "parade"!

2 out of 5/ 40%

www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/toronto-film-festival/10292256/Prisoners-Toronto-Film-Festival-review.html

Prisoners, Toronto Film Festival, review
Denis Villeneuve's mess of a movie lines up some meaty conflicts then fails to follow them through, argues Tim Robey.

2 out of 5

Dir: Denis Villeneuve. Stars: Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, Maria Bello, Terrence Howard, Viola Davis.

The trailer for Prisoners makes it out to be heavy-duty, thriller-drama awards bait – Mystic River goes to suburban Pennsylvania, if you will, with Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal donning super-intense serious-faces. This seems a misleading promotional strategy once you’ve actually seen the movie, which spins an against-the-clock search for two missing pre-teen girls into ever wackier, less reputable orbits. The film is both better than you might imagine – in a doolally sort of way – and more trivial, for all its smog-like aura of utter, unremitting despair.

The director, Denis Villeneuve, had an art-house hit with the Oscar-nominated Incendies (2010), which I’ll confess I found hideously manipulative and overrated. Many of those willing to extend him the benefit of the doubt in that calculated downer may struggle to make the same allowances here, as the script, by Aaron Guzikowski (Contraband), lines up some meaty moral conflicts without the integrity or wherewithal to follow them through.

Jackman and Maria Bello play one pair of desperate parents, Terrence Howard and Viola Davis the other – one of the movie's major disappointments is how little both of these cracking actresses get to do, though both make hay with the few significant moments dispensed. Their daughters are playmates who step out one Thanksgiving and don’t come back: enter a tattooed, twitchy Gyllenhaal as a maverick cop who’s never lost a case. He gets straight down to business by arresting a weirdo RV driver (Paul Dano) seen loitering suspiciously on the relevant street, but the lack of physical evidence encourages Jackman’s hot-headed carpenter to take the law into his own hands.

For a grim stretch in the middle, it looks as if Villeneuve and Guzikowski are intending the vigilante kidnapping of Dano’s character, and his torture by jackhammer and scalding showers, to serve as a figurative study of illegal detention and extreme interrogation methods applied to any American foe. The guilt or innocence of this damaged man-child is still up for dispute, but Jackman, with the queasy help of his neighbours, fastens on him as the only hope to get their girls back, and ties him up in one corner of a derelict parental house where no one will look. The level of debate is crude at best – it consists of a soulful Howard complaining “It’s not right!” a few times, while Jackman rises to a frenzy of vituperative frustration, losing sight of the bigger picture as he slams in another punch.



What’s unconvincing is how cagily the movie retreats backwards out of this alley, relying on blind happenstance to unearth the necessary clues, as if it doesn’t want to repeat that Zero Dark Thirty error of implying that torture gets results. This leaves it broken-backed as either rough-justice tract or police procedural, since Gyllenhaal’s Detective Loki is hardly doing sparkling honour to his badge – a late-in-the-movie mishap in the interrogation room would surely get him fired, and his deductions rarely go anywhere useful. The last, convoluted hour is an Emmental of plot holes and practically random thriller signifiers – cases of snakes, child mannequins, scribbled maps of insoluble mazes. You wonder if the whole torture-based morality play idea struck everyone as commercially dubious, and the decision was made to go for broke.

Flexing some of that Jean Valjean resolve, but with a payload of untrammelled, Wolverine-like rage behind it, Jackman comes closest to shouldering the movie, without ever seriously threatening to make it work. Still, he makes a better fist of his role than Gyllenhaal, in his second consecutive vehicle for Villeneuve after the doppelgänger drama Enemy, which is also playing in Toronto this year. Loki is a collection of fussy tics in search of a personality, but even he feels thoughtfully drawn next to Dano’s lanky, sweating stooge and an almost choicely cartoonish Melissa Leo, essentially cast in the Melissa Leo role as every suspected child molester’s favourite shabby auntie. Aged up with a prim grey wig and glasses that look as if they were purchased in the late Seventies, she gives this absurd part more welly than it’s worth, entering a previously unguessed realm of looney-tunes theatrics.

Mine was the comment below correcting the location (Georgia where it was shot) to Pennsylvania (where the movie takes place) which got a snide Twitter reply saying if it had been positive I wouldn't have complained. So I went back and thanked him for correcting the post and then called him sloppy for comparing a script written long before Zero Dark Thirty that hadn't been seen when it was written. Didn't mention that untrammeled only has one "L" unless that is a British spelling similar to the "ou" in honour and neighbours. Don't mess with me Bub!!

[jo]

Hope everyone gets to read your comments on the Telegraph review page, Jamie

In the meantime, here's another review that rates "fresh" on RT --


www.movies.com/movie-news/prisoners-review/13440

'Prisoners' Is an Emotionally Intense, Edge-of-Your-Seat Thrill Ride
By Erik Davis Sep 05, 2013


Speaking as a father of two, a parent's worst fear is that something bad will happen to their children. And if that something bad does happen, what do you do? How do you cope? Who do you become? Where do you go next? In Prisoners (due out September 20), every single character is forced to spend time in their own hellish prison, be it physical or psychological (or both), when the kidnapping of two little girls rocks a quiet, little blue-collar Pennsylvania town. It's a cold, dark film that twists and turns its way down wintry roads, through empty woods and inside deserted buildings. It'll test the way you root for a character as you navigate your way around the many complexities a person faces during a tragic event. People throw around the term "edge of your seat" a lot when it comes to movies with a bit of a faster pulse, but Prisoners is different. It's an emotionally intense edge-of-your-seat thrill ride that won't let go of your mind, body and soul until the title card appears in the end credits.

There are many stars in this one (Terrence Howard, Jake Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis, Paul Dano, Melissa Leo, Maria Bello), but the film truly belongs to Hugh Jackman and cinematographer Roger Deakins (Skyfall), whose stark, creepy visuals set an unsettling tone right from the start. Jackman plays a man's man, a survivalist who stocks up on supplies and advice for his son in the event the world as they know it begins crumbling around them. He's tough, rugged (and bearded), and when his precious young daughter goes missing during a Thanksgiving dinner with the neighbors (Howard, Davis), it's not long before he's taking matters into his own blood-soaked hands.

Standing in the way of this desperate father turned vigilante is a detective (Gyllenhaal) who's doing everything he can to solve the case and find those children without parental interference, as well as the father (Howard) of the other girl gone missing and the quietly deranged man (Dano) who may or may not know where the kids are.

As each minute ticks by without a resolution, tension builds. Just when you think you have it figured out, the script throws a curveball. Just when you think you know how it's going to end, the characters surprise you yet again. What's great about Prisoners is that it's a fantastic thriller that gives you just enough information to keep you glued to the plot while your emotions run wild, ultimately forcing each audience member into their own complicated confinement -- trapped somewhere between right and wrong, good and bad.

Where do you draw the line when it comes to protecting your family? It's not an easy question to answer, and it won't get any easier after you see Prisoners.

[jo]

Another review which disagreed with the entire premise and whole point of the movie --

www.craveonline.com/film/reviews/565855-tiff-2013-review-prisoners

TIFF 2013 Review: Prisoners

Jake Gyllenhaal and Hugh Jackman star in a kidnapping movie that plays like intellectual torture porn.

September 6th, 2013Fred Topel

To be fair, Prisoners was not a movie I was particularly interested in based on the premise and the trailer. It’s one of those fortunate circumstances of timing where a studio film with the right elements is coming out relatively soon after a film festival, so it can be one of the A-list talent centerpieces of the Toronto International Film Festival (and Telluride before).

As such, it is one of the major titles to report on as a festival premiere for early buzz. That actually makes me angrier that I could’ve seen some hungry new talent’s debut masterpiece instead, but that’s irrelevant to you, the viewer, who will seek out the latest Hugh Jackman/Jake Gyllenhaal movie when it hits theaters.

Prisoners is intellectual torture porn. It’s torture of both the emotional kind and the bloody kind. I like movies about grief and dark themes, but I hate self-importance. Parts of Prisoners are chilling, sure, but to what end? To say that bad things happen? That’s actually missing the point of movies about tragedy, or actual torture porn. Grief movies are there to say that there is still a life to live for the survivors. Good torture horror films are about consequences and resurrections, spiritual and literal. Prisoners takes two and a half hours to revel in misery with little more than a plot twist as the reward.

Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) and Franklin Birch (Terrence Howard) are family friends whose daughters go missing. Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) is investigating, but their only suspect Alex Jones (Paul Dano) is let go because he has a 10-year-old’s I.Q. and can’t tell them anything. So Keller kidnaps and tortures Alex himself.

The film has to spend a full hour on the standard police investigation and family grief just to prove it’s realistic. Sure, this isn’t a “Law & Order” episode where the characters just deliver the lines of the plot. We’ve got to let Jackman show how unhinged Keller is becoming. We’ve got to let Maria Bello show how his wife Grace medicates herself to cope with the loss.

The actors are very good at portraying the depth of impossible situations. Unfortunately they are only given superficial signifiers. We meet Loki eating Thanksgiving dinner by himself in a Chinese restaurant. Get it? Because he’s a loner! Later he throws all the work off his desk in frustration. I’m just asking the writers to come up with new ways to portray these character beats. I had the same problem in Argo when he wakes up surrounded by empty takeout boxes. I do other things to indicate my social problems! Can’t movie people do different things too?

As much attention is paid to Keller’s line-crossing vigilante plot, I feel it’s only lip service, all two and a half hours of it. Not that we’re rooting for Keller to torture Alex. On the contrary, we’re blatantly being given our medicine for even thinking that we’d like to just kill the creepy guy we assume did it. Keller pushes Franklin past his edge. Point taken, I get that. Not every father can go as far as Keller, but Franklin’s reaction is at least more complicated than just “torture is wrong.” It’s more like “torture is not for me.”

In trying to explain how exploitive this material is without spoiling the plot, I’m alluding to a lack of payoff I can’t quite specify. There may be a good number of red herrings, including a sequence that may be the anti-Hitchcock. It’s constructed in such a way that you have all the elements necessary to worry that one character is getting found out, but it’s not even a misdirect. It’s a nondirect. It’s just a scene where something doesn’t happen, but it doesn’t happen really suspensefully!

Now I don’t want to spoil a movie that you still may see, even if I didn’t like it. A normal audience of people who haven’t watched every studio movie released in the last 30 years may even be surprised, so great. The critical community, however, has the same references I do and should have found Prisoners entirely predictable. I can’t name those references because then it’s a spoiler, but if you end up seeing Prisoners and you tell me you didn’t see that coming, then I owe you a coke.

If Ransom was a Hollywood version of a kidnapping designed to make you feel safe, that everything was really going to be okay, Prisoners is designed to be unsettling for the sake of being unsettling. I generally like unsettling movies if they’re effective, but the machinations were so apparent to me it made me resentful.

4 of 10

He was probably asked to see the movie he did not want to see by his editor - LOL! I can see a review that is more negative than positive -- but such outrage! As if the entire movie did not have any redeeming value at all! Tsk, tsk!

[jo]

On the heels of that review --


Here is a very thoughtful review from someone I trust for his objectivity and insights -- Drew McWeeney of HitFix. He used to be AICN's best contributor, as Moriarty...and left to found his own website, HitFix.

www.hitfix.com/motion-captured/review-hugh-jackman-and-jake-gyllenhaal-both-dig-deep-for-the-brutal-haunting-prisoners

Review: Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal both dig deep for the brutal, haunting 'Prisoners'

The French-Canadian director of 'Incendies' makes a strong US debut

By Drew McWeeny Saturday, Sep 7, 2013 2:25 AM

HitFix

B+

Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal find different paths through the darkness in the harrowing new film 'Prisoners'

Credit: Warner Bros


TORONTO - I think it's safe to say that "Prisoners" is the best police procedural since "Se7en," and it works as a grim, ugly companion piece to that film in the way it is meticulously plotted without ever truly telegraphing its intentions. The difference is that "Prisoners" also focuses on the way grief drives us mad in the long haul, and just how fragile parents are when it comes to the notion of anything happening to their children.

I've certainly seen a number of films that cover similar thematic ground to "Prisoners," but Aaron Guzikowski's script takes its time, laying out its various tricks and traps very carefully, so that when it decides to hurt you emotionally, it does so with maximum efficiency. The film begins with a Thanksgiving celebration shared by two families. Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) and his wife Grace (Maria Bello) take their kids down the street to share the day with Franklin Birch (Terrence Howard) and his wife Nancy (Viola Davis). Ralph (Dylan Minnette) and Eliza (Zoe Borde) are the teenagers in the families, and they also both have little girls, Anna (Erin Gerasimovich) and Joy (Kyla Drew Simmons).

One of the things that makes the set-up to "Prisoners" so effective is how simple it is, how non-eventful and normal every decision is that leads to the gut-wrenching moment when both families realize that the little girls have disappeared. No one does anything wrong. They're just two families, hanging out, enjoying the holiday, relaxing, and by the time they realize what's happened, they are already too late to do anything about it. The police become involved, and Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) is assigned to their case. He's a twitchy, sunken-eyed guy with an exemplary performance record, and Gyllenhaal is a fascinating study in details here. They don't explain much about him, but there are all of these small, strange clues about his past. He's got tattoos on his knuckles, and at one point, he makes reference to a childhood full of abuse and worse.

Almost immediately, there is a suspect. There was a beat-up old camper in their neighborhood that day, and it is quickly traced to one Alex Jones (Paul Dano). When police spot the camper and try to approach it, he rams it into some trees trying to escape. Loki pulls him out and tunes him up a bit to try to get him to admit he had something to do with the girls, but Alex is quickly revealed to be a slightly retarded man-child, barely competent to be out in public by himself.

To explain anything else about the plot beyond that point would be criminal. The film continues to lay new pieces out for consideration all the way up to the moment the closing credits roll, and I really enjoyed not knowing how things would come together. It seems rare these days to see a film like this that can actually keep me on edge all the way through. Terrence Howard does some very interesting work in the film, especially as Jackman's character starts to sink into a darkness he may not be able to shake, and Viola Davis also has a few great stand-out moments. Bello does a good job of playing a mother in complete full-system shock, but that sidelines her for much of the film as a result. Honestly, the film belongs to Jackman and Gyllenhaal, who both play men who are driven by demons, darker than they initially appear, willing to do whatever it takes to resolve this unthinkable situation. It might be Jackman's best overall performance, and it allows him to play anger and rage in a way that is completely different than what we've seen from him as Wolverine. This is far more primal, and far scarier. Dano has the market cornered on soft-faced weirdos, and I like how the film refuses to make it easy to figure him out as a character here. There's one moment that comes about a half-hour after he's been introduced that is so despicable, so off-handedly awful, that it would seem to immediately snap the plot into focus, but don't be fooled so easily. No one in "Prisoners" is what they initially appear to be.

Denis Villeneuve made the strong "Incendies" a few years back, another film in which people reveal their natures to the surprise of those closest to them, and I can see why someone would read "Prisoners" and offer it to him. He attacks Guzikowski's script like a starving man handed a cheeseburger, and he ladles on the style, finding beauty even in the worst things the film shows. It helps that he's got Roger Deakins shooting the film, and I think it's hauntingly lovely in places.

The film's a little precious in terms of pace, and there's a lot of ground covered in the more than two-and-a-half hours, some of which could have been condensed or even trimmed. And If there's a weak link in the movie in terms of performance, it's Melissa Leo, but part of that is what she's given to do. At least two of her scenes exist solely to dump information on the audience, and it's an inelegant note in an otherwise very strong script. Still, the cumulative power of what the film says and how it says it had me physically anxious for much of the second half, and I felt like I wanted to get up and yell during the film's closing stretch. It is masterfully built where it matters, and despite the film's 2:40 minute running time, I suspect this is going to be a film that manages that rare one-two commercial and critical punch, and should lead to a lot more work from both Guzikowski and Villenueve. "Prisoners" pulls no punches, and it wants to leave a mark on you, and it is a testament to all involved that it manages to accomplish those things so well.

"Prisoners" opens in the US on September 20, 2013.

[jo]

Not written like a formal review, because it evolves from a conversation by the Film Critic of the Montreal Gazette with Denis Villeneuve. But one can glean the critical impression from the featured article ( the words in italics) --

www.montrealgazette.com/entertainment/movie-guide/truth+another+thriller/8878619/story.html

One man’s truth, another man’s thriller


Denis Villeneuve gives Hollywood treatment to ‘exploration of the dark part of the human soul’


By T'Cha Dunlevy, GAZETTE FILM CRITIC September 6, 2013

MONTREAL — The film is called Prisoners, but Denis Villeneuve appeared liberated. The Quebec director sat in a Toronto hotel room Thursday afternoon, taking a philosophical approach to his first brush with the Hollywood machine.

Prisoners had its world première Friday at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), after a sneak peak at the Telluride Film Festival last week. It’s a gripping, scary, surprisingly violent thriller starring Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis, Terrence Howard, Melissa Leo and Maria Bello — not the kind of thing you’d expect from the director of probing French-language films Incendies (also in Arabic), Polytechnique, Maelström and Un 32 août sur terre.

Then again, it’s exactly what you’d expect if you imagined Villeneuve making his version of a Hollywood nail-biter.

“It’s a movie about grey zones,” he said, “not about black and white. It was an exploration of the dark part of the human soul for me.”

He’s not just talking the talk. Prisoners pulsates with real discomfort, pulling you into its twisted world and holding you by the throat for two and-a-half hours before finally relenting, and releasing you.

Two little girls go missing on Thanksgiving weekend. The police apprehend a suspect quickly. But when Detective Loki (Gyllenhaal) doesn’t seem to be taking the case seriously enough — letting the man go due to lack of evidence — grieving father Keller Dover (Jackman) takes matters into his own hands, leading to a game of cat and mouse between him, Loki, the presumed child molester and several other strategically placed characters.

The starting point, for Villeneuve, was the taut script by Aaron Guzikowski (Contraband).

“I loved what it was saying about us today,” he said, “our relationship with violence, especially toward torture, and how violence is spreading within intimacy, destroying our family tissues. They’re things I thought were very accurate, profound, beautiful and powerful.”

Leave it to Villeneuve to find such depth in what, in other hands, could be another episode of your standard television cop show. The appeal of Prisoners lies not so much in what happens as to whom it happens, and how they react.

There is incredible tension, most of which Villeneuve insists was in the original screenplay; but it only works because the director imbues every scene with pulsating humanity. You’ve never seen Jackman this frenetic, intense or unpredictable. He’s a bible-thumping, gun-toting rural father preparing for the end of the world. So when his family is torn apart, he goes off the deep end.


“He wanted to go there,” Villeneuve said of Jackman. “He jumped on board — totally, totally, totally. He was the nicest actor I have ever worked with. He was totally committed and easygoing … He was very attracted (by the project). He had been doing Wolverine several times in a row, or (playing) Mr. Nice Guy. I think he wanted to experiment. It’s healthy for actors to take risks, and for him it was a risk; but I never felt his fear. He trusted me all the way.”


Prisoners marks Gyllenhaal’s second collaboration with Villeneuve, along with the José Saramago adaptation Enemy, which has its world première Sunday at TIFF. The actor also explores new territory, alternating between tough top cop, young keener out of his depth and open-faced, sympathetic Everyman.

“We very quickly bonded,” Villeneuve said. “We had a lot of things in common, as artists and men. We became, very quickly, close friends. Our relationship is born out of the will to see the truth and be authentic. We’re super straightforward (with each other), like brothers.

“It was a bit scary for the crew, because we can say harsh things to each other, be angry and yell at each other, hate each other, then love each other again. But we loved working together so much on Enemy that I felt there was a chance to go much further with Prisoners.”

He had been doing Wolverine several times in a row, or (playing) Mr. Nice Guy. I think he wanted to experiment.

I wonder if Villeneuve is familiar with The Fountain and The Prestige? Or even Les Miserables?

Jo