Publicity
Stills of "Captivity"
(Courtesy from Shaw)
Genre:
Thriller Director: Roland Joffe Cast: Elisha Cuthbert, Pruitt Taylor-Vince,
Daniel Gillies RunTime: 1 hr 25 mins Released By: Shaw Rating: M18 (Violence) Official Website:www.captivitythemovie.com
Opening Day: 26 July 2007
Synopsis:
A fashion model and a chauffeur are kidnapped and held hostage
in a small room by a serial killer. While the madman methodically
terrorizes them, the victims draw strength from each other….
Movie Review:
You know the drill. Hold a seemingly helpless person captive,
and for reasons to be explained, allow perverse acts of violence
to be performed on them. The bloodier, the better, and brownie
points are earned if the weapons of mass torture are either
creatively and elaborately designed, or stem from the use
of everyday tools. From the Saw franchise, to hostels with
hitch-hiking turistas and the hills starting to have eyes
in wolf creek, is the "torture porn" sub genre trying
so shamelessly to outdo or remaking themselves, and in doing
so, start becoming predictable, and worse, a yawn fest?
If
Captivity is any indication of where Torture Porn is heading,
then I'd say, it's time to pull the plug. Audiences have come
to expect whatever twists and turns that can possibly be mustered,
and stay one step ahead of the game. We might wince at whatever
sick games the filmmakers can throw at us, but sometimes,
enough is enough, especially when the production values are
a tad poor, and in trying to extrapolate what is essentially
a short film material, have scenes repeat after themselves
that it's sleep inducing, and borders on the ridiculous.
Sure,
some loose ends might tie down at the end when it's time to
show hand, but Captivity does so in a rather clumsy manner,
it's almost comical. In fact, there's this major loophole
that is so in-your-face, it's blatantly lazy storytelling.
There's nothing too intelligent too about the rationale behind
the cruel acts, unlike Saw's Jigsaw becoming an iconic cult
figure in the genre, with some charisma and a sense of warped
moral values, or profiteering in some other movies. Here,
it basically boils down to sex, what else, in trying to complete
the sex-and-violence circle to lure lusty men in watching
Elisha Cuthbert wriggle her way out of bondage.
As
the story goes, Cuthbert plays a fashion supermodel Jennifer,
who's face is plastered all over the city, a fact that director
Roland Joffe never fails to remind you of. Being high profiled,
everything she wants you to know about her personal life,
gets shared in interviews and the likes, which makes it easy
for would be stalkers to play on her worse nightmares. Cut
to the chase, she's abducted, and gets imprisoned in a high-tech-low-tech
room, from which she tries her best to escape from.
And
here's where you'll groan at the repetitive attempt-fail-punishment
routine, where she's teased during captivity when she gets
recaptured time and again. With the constant fade to blacks,
you can almost guess when the lights will turn off for our
protagonist, every step of the way. It gets worse as the story
gets prolonged with the introduction of throwaway characters,
and perhaps one of the worse ways of having the characters
release some pressure amid the high tension environment.
Co-written
by Larry Cohen, who did manage to show a thing or two about
building tension with Phone Booth, this story had nothing
except Lame and Laziness written all over it. And I can justify
that, because he and co-writer Joseph Tura forgotten all about
Fido. Tsk.
