“Prisoners,” starring Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhall, is
preoccupied with torture, imprisonment, death and a sense of foreboding and at
153 minutes in length, it’s hard viewing. The movie, directed by Denis
Villenueve, is supposed to be about something significant, but if you strip
away the pedigree of the people involved, what’s left is a twisty kidnap flick
filled with the obligatory creepy suspects, red herrings and icky visuals.
Essentially, “Prisoners” is about a decent man (Jackman)
turning vigilante when his young daughter and her friend are kidnapped. When
the police (Gyllenhal) get nowhere questioning the suspect, our hero abducts
the creepy suspect (Paul Dano) and holds him in an abandoned house and attempts
to beat the information out of him. And beats him and beats him…… Jackman tries
hard to be Everyman who may be as deranged as any child molester, but he’s
given ludicrous lines, such as when he whacks Alex (Dano) and screams, ‘Why are
you making me do this?’ so it’s
often hard to take his character seriously. “Prisoners” would have been a
better movie if it were 60 minutes shorter. 9/23/13
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