Trap was certainly a thriller that I was incredibly cautious towards. Revealing a paramount plot point in the trailer made me very cautious indeed, however the trailers looked very interesting and to see Josh Hartnett back in the spotlight turned me back into my optimistic self. 

Now, while I do think Trap is flawed, and trust me there’s a lot of flaws, I think if you see Trap from a different lens or rose tinted glasses if you will, i can say that Trap is my favourite M Night film since Split. I think the best part about Trap is definitely Josh Hartnett, embodying the father who wishes best for her daughter while also trying to conceal his identity and keep his faux emotions balanced, I really enjoyed his role here and he properly embodies that Jack Torrence that I could not get enough of. As a whole, the film is actually quite funny. Goofy, mostly, but the film just knows when to have cringy dad moments and genuine comedy and not have them two overlap and make the experience increasingly more awkward. I guess that mini twist coming to the end I enjoyed, however, come to think of it- there was no big Shymalan twist. Unless;

1. The twist is that there is no twist. The final scene (very good final scene I might add) is a maniacal laugh echoed from Shymalan as he tricks us into believing that there was going to be a big ta-da twist. 

2. The sudden shift of scene, we all thought that the entire film was going to be set in the concert. Boom, a lot of the scenes from the trailer come from that first 45 minutes-1 hour. Then, we go and expand. Kind of plot twist? 

3. The film is not a horror. From the idea of a serial killer stuck in a concert arena, you’d think there would be gore and violence and brutal scenes of Hartnett causing havoc. The twist? It’s not like that. A thrilling physiological experience is what Night wanted us to have and we didn’t (or maybe you did I don’t know this is the 3rd one) see it coming. 

On the other hand, there’s a lot of bad cards Trap holds that really don’t make them look glamorous at all. I know it’s very safe to go after plot holes when there is multiple characteristics of a film you can critique and feel a lot more better about your review, but god damn there was a lot of plot holes. And these fragments occurred frequently throughout watching Trap, really bringing you out of that thrill at points and just makes you think that these characters are dumb. Another thing that kind of annoys me is the clunky dialogue, M is known for having artificial-like dialogue and here is no different, faux conversations all over the shop and it only really works with Hartnett as this stone cold killer with the emotions of a breadstick. Other than that, it don’t work. Through one lens, you could argue this movie is given as a pedestal to boost Shymalan’s daughter’s singing career, which also conveniently gives her a lot of screen time in that second act, all I can say is that her and a couple of other characters acting chops were a bit iffy. However the main issue I have with this is that the film eventually slows down in that second half, the thrills get less thrilly and the movie wants us to dig deeper into lore or expanding the world and I felt that this just wasn’t the route it should’ve gone for, I liked the idea of a solid 90 minutes inside the concert but I guess the big boy did not. 

Overall, if you enjoyed the trailers of Trap, you will definitely enjoy the first half of it. The second act really make or breaks it for a lot of people, in true M Night Shymalan fashion. While there are a lot of negatives involved, don’t get me even started on the nepotism allegations, I actually really enjoyed Trap. Never got bored, it’s a fun ride and it’s M’s most tense and gripping movies in a long time. And the music was good, god I love me some fucking Lady Raven.