Review of Panic Room (2002) by Wayne K — 18 Apr 2018

David Fincher is what I'd call a reliable Director, a filmmaker who can always be trusted to deliver a quality product. Fight Club, Seven, The Social Network, all great films I'd happily watch again.

Panic Room is yet another addition to that list. It might lack the satire or ironic humour of his best work, but it's a solidly crafted inhouse thriller. It overexploits the 'dumb criminal with no foresight' trope, and Fincher's flashy camera movements are forgotten about when the story gets going, as is Jodie Foster's claustrophobia.

It often feels like it's attempting to ape Hitchcock, creating a tense, confined atmosphere and editing it in such a way as to put the audience in as uncomfortable a situation as the protagonists are, and for the most part it succeeds, especially when accompanied by the creepy, unsettling score.

Forest Whitaker, unsurprisingly, is the best of the baddies, taking all the measures he needs to get his job done while never succumbing to plain greed or unnecessary violence. He might be one of the most most sympathetic villains I've ever seen onscreen.

Leto gets to have plenty of fun in a role that drifts wildly between scenery stealing and scenery chewing, and Foster plays the tough mom defending a child with gusto. While it might be considered among his minor work, on the resume of David Fincher, that's still a glowing recommendation.