One always looks forward to the twist in an M. Night Shyamalan movie. It’s the key ingredient that has mostly characterised his films in the aftermath of The Sixth Sense (1999) and its mind-bender climax. Pulling the rug from under the feet of his audience, has usually meant that Shyamalan has lugged so much to get to the *final* reveal that the payoff has rarely matched up.
In his latest venture, Trap, Shyamalan riffs on this final reveal shtick, something his legacy has been entirely (and wrongly) boiled down to. Hence, the climax here is a case of Chinese boxes – where Shyamalan teases us with a ‘satisfying’ end – only to tell us a few moments later that the film isn’t over yet. Almost like a life story rarely having a clean, conclusive “the end” banner – Shyamalan seems to be hinting that his twists aren’t where his stories end. Evil doesn’t magically cease to exist at the end of a film or a show, people’s basest instincts don’t change, and unlike in the movies, sometimes there’s no catharsis. Along with that, Shyamalan also seems to be having fun with what people have come to expect from his movies. It’s a bold, assured move from a filmmaker – who writes himself into corners, and somehow conjures a solution out of it.
Photo: Screengrab from video.
(Mild spoilers ahead)
In Trap, Cooper (Josh Hartnett) seems like a regular suburban father taking his daughter Riley (Ariel Donoghue) to see her favourite popstar, Lady Raven (Saleka Night Shyamalan). He’s surprised to note the unusual police presence at the concert. Talking to an over-enthusiastic employee selling merchandise at the venue, Cooper learns that the concert is a trap for a serial killer known as ‘The Butcher’. Cooper only has to fleetingly clench his jaw and smile through his eyes which seem to have nothing behind them, to tell the audience that the cops are looking for him.
Shyamalan’s film unfolds from the point-of-view of the serial killer, on the day he might finally get caught. So the audience learns things only when the protagonist discovers new information. It’s a masterclass in exposition. Over the course of the film, we get to know how the cops learned about The Butcher’s whereabouts, and his presence at the concert. As Cooper scampers around to find a way out without being recognised, we become privy to his resourcefulness. Nicking away walkie-talkies, ID cards, code-words, simultaneously juggling his duties as a father and meticulous psychopath, Cooper is the anti-hero of our dreams.
Hartnett, once pegged to be Hollywood’s next movie star and then slowly fading from A-list projects, is a curious choice for the part. He has the leftover good looks of a high school quarterback, who fits right in. His mild demeanour, strong build and lush hair also mean he won’t evoke suspicion, and can comfortably slip under the radar. Shyamalan takes great pleasure in showing Cooper making the most of his environment, plotting his way out of the crisis.
The film is guilty of contriving Cooper’s efforts – like the way in which the father-daughter are escorted backstage too easily; all it takes is a story mentioning “leukaemia”. But Trap is also kind of silly and self-assured, where one can see Shyamalan winking at (and even pleading with) his audience each time he cuts a corner, to make way to a satisfactory resolution. Cooper’s ‘antagonist’ in this case is a frigid voice of an FBI profiler called Dr. Josephine Grant (Hayley Mills), who is anticipating most of his ploys, and warning the troops about all possible misdirections that could lead to the killer getting away.
Photo: Screengrab from video.
Shyamalan throws his best curveball, when the popstar gets involved in the plot. Unlike a lot of his contemporaries, who might sneer at pop musicians who inspire an almost cult-like devotion from girls and women of a certain age (like, say, Taylor Swift) and social media, Shyamalan flips our expectations when it appears least likely. Using a series of brisk movements and decisions, Lady Raven becomes an unlikely saviour, and social media [the tool behind widespread hate] and helps prevent a murder of The Butcher’s latest victim – an Asian man stuck in a basement with a remote-controlled carbon monoxide sprayer in his vicinity. In meme-speak, the film offers a “What is vs What could have been” scenario on the boons of social media.
One of the most exhilarating things about Trap is how much of its silliness feels designed. The way Shyamalan invokes the tropes of a serial killer movie – such as Dr Grant explaining the killer’s obsessive, compulsive modus operandi, or Shyamalan hinting at Cooper’s childhood trauma that led him to becoming a serial killer – feel like loving tributes. The performances (especially by Hartnett) follow the beats of a black comedy, and the darkness within the killer seems to come from a void of nothingness – much like the bitterness we encounter in the comments section. This is a smart way to reinvent the serial killer film – which usually unfolds from the point-of-view of detectives investigating the crimes. Instead, we find ourselves rooting for Cooper here.
The smile from the killer in the last scene of the film, which probably intentionally mirrors Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960), comes off as an acknowledgement for our complicity in deifying such characters in pop culture. Unlike most films these days that end on a cliffhanger, signalling a possible franchise, here Shyamalan seems to be mocking the practice. After all, most audience members would willingly pull the rug from under their own feet, only to experience the thrill.
*Trap is playing in theatres
