Review of Lockout (2012) by Zanele J — 30 Dec 2012

By Zanele Jiane.

This is a good, consistent, straightforward, and proportionate throughout story.

Prisoners are shielded from physical and sexual abuse that normally frighten new inmates. They are now jailed right outside the Earth's atmosphere and are put in a âStasisâ?, a form of controlled sleep. This sleep tends to have an adverse effect on some inmates who end up suffering from dementia. The first daughter (Maggie Grace) suspects that this facility is used to run unregulated experiments on the prisoners and she sets out to find out as she goes on a humanitarian M.S. One, the name of the prison.

Things get out of hand during one of the interviews as with the first daughter and one of the inmates, Hydell (Joseph Gilgun) escapes, he kills key personnel and release the rest of his fellow prisoners, the first daughter is kidnapped and Snow (Guy Pearce) on his way to serve 30 years in M.S.One is given an option of rescuing the first daughter in exchange for a clean slate.

Guy Pearce who normally play no nonsense, by the book characters, surprises fans here as he plays his character Snow in a leisurely fashion, almost carelessly, spitting jokes regardless of the situation, most of them being serious, it's distracting sometimes. Maggie Grace plays her character spectacularly, her caring attitude towards people of all kinds and listening skills saves the day as she figures out information critical to the movie that a less attentive person can miss out on, very balanced character.

The bad guys led by Alex (Vincent Regan) and Hydell, Alex is negotiable and level headed, giving us a villain we can trust to do the right thing when required of the situation and Hydell's character is disgustingly lunatic.

Technically the movie is on par with similar movies and gives us a set adequate for the story to flourish.

Recommended.