Review of Prisoners (2013) by Vguru R — 30 Oct 2014

So what was my favorite movie last year? The crossover between Wolverine and the Prince of Persia (I'm sorry for referencing the latter film--it's awful I know). But in all seriousness my favorite film of 2013 was in fact the drama PRISONERS, directed by Denis Villeneuve; and it has an extremely talented cast, the leads being Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal.

Prisoners is about two families' (Jackman's and Terence Howard's) youngest daughters getting abducted, and then the subsequent search for the two girls; one path lead by Detective Loki (Gyllenhaal) and the other lead by Jackman who takes a far more dark and violent route to find his daughter.

First of all I shall start by saying the obvious, I loved this movie. But second, I have to preach Jake Gyllenhaal here. In my opinion he is one of Hollywood's best, yet underrated actors, and in Prisoners he gives his best performance to date.

He almost stole the show from Jackman, but they were off by an extremely minuscule amount, in my opinion. Gyllenhaal's portrayal of this hardened detective (who's solved every case in the past) was amazing.

It's as if the moment I saw him, before he even spoke a line, I could just immediately tell upon his expression, his overall look that the character had been through some serious incidents in the past.

One look on his character made me feel so much, think about how great the performance must have been. I must give a big shout out to Hugh Jackman for once again proving that he can play powerful characters OTHER THAN WOLVERINE.

In fact it's movies like these where we get to see yet another layer to his abilities as an actor--this time as a grieving father who slowly digresses into violence and cruelty all in a persistent attempt to find his daughter, Jackman was my favorite performance in the film.

To put it lightly he was fucking intense. The scenes that were just Jackman and Gyllenhaal arguing were EPIC, and once I got the DVD, I kid you not I rewinded those scenes to experience that awesomeness again.

I swear if last year's Oscars wasn't so stacked, Jackman or Gyllenhaal would have probably got a nod. They are also acting with a fantastic script, not the best of all time, but I do need to praise the screenwriter for giving these actors and the director awesome material anyway.

However, not only was the acting great, Prisoners must also be celebrated for its technical aspects. Every single shot looked beautiful to me--Roger Deakins (who did get an Oscar nod for his cinematography work on Prisoners) did wonders with this movie.

It was surprising how perfect all the camerawork was-- it astounded me in the theater watching this beauty of a movie. And by the end... I was... Prisoners left me speechless. Villeneuve had done a top notch job directing it, and the ending was spectacular.

And so Prisoners was a fucking awesome, intense, and dramatic movie. This film was the best for me last year and everyone has absolutely got to check this movie out - 10/10.