Review of Prisoners

A thriller like Prisoners is a treat for mainstream audiences. It delivers all that's expected from a top-notch mystery/police procedural, and its missteps are few, minor, and far between. It offers a consistently unpredictable narrative, well-developed characters, and hard-hitting moral questions. A full plate, to be sure, and one that earns every minute of its 2 hour, 26 minute running time. As the first English-language feature film from Canadian-born director Dennis Villeneuve, Prisoners is quite the auspicious debut. Like any dark, Oscar-hopeful, it accomplishes the dual feat of entertaining and enriching.

The story starts straightforwardly enough, with two families gathering for Thanksgiving dinner. They are Keller and Grace Dover (Hugh Jackman and Mario Bello) and Franklin and Nancy Birch (Terrence Howard and Viola Davis). After dinner, while the adults chat and the teenagers lounge around watching TV, the families' two young girls, Anna (Erin Gerasimovich) and Joy (Kyla Drew Simmons) go outside to play. But the girls never return. When a routine search of the neighborhood doesn't turn them up, the families call the police. And that's when Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal), a lonely but ambitious cop with a superb track record for solving cases, enters the scene. Circumstantial evidence points to Alex Jones (Paul Dano) as a likely culprit. After all, the two girls once came across the RV where he sleeps. But when the police discover he has the mental capacity of a 10-year-old and couldn't possibly have orchestrated a kidnapping scheme, they release him after a few days. An angry, grief-stricken Keller is convinced Alex knows something, and since the police are unable to wring it from him, he'll take matters into his own hands by any means necessary.

With its story involving child abduction and potential murder, Prisoners is certainly topical, and it delivers plenty of food for thought and debate. Keller is obsessed with justice, as is the public at large to a certain degree whenever a horrific crime is committed. Like him, we suspect something about Alex's demeanor and what he knows/doesn't know just doesn't feel right. His chief motive (saving his daughter) may be laudable, but does that give him the right to take the law into his own hands? And what if he's wrong? When Alex whispers something to him during an early confrontation, is he (and therefore we) just hearing things or taking them out of context? By constructing the film as a mystery, Villeneuve creates a similar feeling in us that infects Keller.

Equally as impressive as Prisoners' thematic content is how effectively it juggles the dual plotlines of Keller's struggle and Loki's investigation. Both are equally fascinating. When the latter takes over, not for a moment do we itch to return to the former. The case in Prisoners unfolds in classic "whodunnit" fashion, complete with clever red herrings, tense sequences, and truly puzzling elements (it's all about the mazes and snakes). This is the kind of movie that keeps a viewer so off-balance that he/she will be grasping for even the most outlandish explanation in hopes to put the pieces together. I suppose it's possible for an extremely attentive viewer to come up with the answer before it is explicitly revealed, but the great strength of Prisoners is how well its constructed and how easy it is to become involved in the lives of these characters.

For the second year in a row, Hugh Jackman figures to enter the Best Actor race, and deservedly so. As great as he was in Les Miserables, he's even more impressive here, perfectly capturing the grief and desperation that any father in his situation would feel, but rarely act upon. Regardless of whether the scene requires him to amp up the intensity or deliver a quieter, more introspective moment, Jackman is up to the task and then some. Also note-perfect is Jake Gyllenhaal, who, between this film and End of Watch, could become one of Hollywood's go-to guy's when a cop role is required. The rest of the cast (three out of five who own Oscar nominations for previous roles) takes on less flashier supporting roles, but there's not a poor performance to be found. Mention must be made of an unrecognizable Melissa Leo, who is superb as always, only this time buried under effective old-age makeup.

Prisoners will unquestionably become one of the most talked-about films of 2013, but just because a story is worth telling doesn't mean it demands all loose ends be neatly tied up. The final scene, taking place after a turn of events that drips with the darkest of irony, ends on an ambiguous note. As usual with these types of conclusions, some will groan with disappointment. But upon careful consideration, it's the perfect way to end the movie, if only for its ability to generate another layer of discussion long after the whodunnit aspect wraps up. Prisoners is that rare mainstream movie that offers a cinematic combo of "thrilling" and "powerful" in one package.

Rating: ***1/2 (out of ****)