This past weekend I took in the new Ben Affleck directed film, The Town and John Erick Dowdle's Devil. On the surface the films really don't have that much in common. The former is a gritty crime thriller and the latter is a supernatural thriller that is the first in a series of films. The former is garnering Oscar buzz and features a number of top notch acting talents. The latter received chuckles when the trailer played and features a group of actors who are relative unknowns (the one guy's claim to fame is either being the stoned guy at the beginning of Super Troopers, or the guy who is married to Christina Hendricks). But when you delve deeper into the psychology of the films there is a pretty large similarity that emerges.
Both films engage in the claustrophobic nature of their environment. In Devil, it's a more literal sense of the word. Five strangers enter an elevator in an office building and are just looking to go to their scheduled meetings. However, the elevator mysteriously stops and it's clear that someone has other plans for them. The devil is among them and for the duration of the film the inhabitants of the elevator try to figure out who is not who they appear to be. Outside the elevator a police investigator is on the case trying to figure out as well who is not what they appear to be. But a majority of our time is spent on the elevator where the five people are trapped in close quarters. Of course, one guy is afraid of confined spaces so he immediately begins panicking. As things start to go haywire everyone else gradually slips away from sanity and begin to feel the closeness of their surroundings. In any other situation a film like this may not work. The confined space adds an extra dimension to the terror of what is happening. Every time the lights flicker off the occupants now are not only trapped but they can't see what is happening right in front of them. Eventually we find out what is going on but the moments building to that are fairly tense- when they focus on the elevator. The cinematographer does a great job of using the mirrors in the elevator to frame all the people in the same shot. Most times though you are in that elevator with them and feel the trapped nature that they feel.
In The Town, you get a more figurative sense of claustrophobia. Ben Affleck plays a guy who was a prospective NHL star from a small neighborhood in Boston, but he blew his chance at the big time. He ends up back in Boston and finds himself in the same line of work as his father- working for a crime boss in the area robbing banks. What he is feeling is the suffocating nature of his surroundings. Hockey for him was a way out of his surroundings. Once he blew that though he ended up back in town and in trying to cope- hooked himself up with a girl, and her kid, and found a way to survive in that environment. But he longs to get away. He talks constantly of a place down in Florida where he thinks his mom went when he was little. The sense of being trapped though is reminiscent of any small town in America.
People always dream of a life that is outside the metaphorical walls of their town. The lives outside of their paint a rosier picture than the ones they see. For Affleck's character there is truth in that. Where he is now, he is burdened with a gangster who hangs over his head. His best friend strong arms him into one more job, and Affleck is smarter than the rest of his crew so he feels obligated to be a part of the operation. The crime boss says himself, "Without you, I don't hire them." Affleck's character feels that he is salvation for the guys in his crew. He provides them work, and money and allows them to live a life- no matter how poor he thinks that life may be. He has been outside those walls though, ever so briefly. He knows what it is like to have a gift of some sort and have an opportunity to expand his world. If only he can escape the trappings of his surroundings. It's a similar to the feelings of the characters in Devil, but there they have no way out- they are pawns in a game being played that is bigger of them. Affleck's character is an active participant in the game so at any point- if he can redirect focus long enough- he has a shot to move away from his trappings.
SO TO RECAP....
Devil is an okay film. It was directed by Dowdle who did the underrated Poughkeepsie Tapes, and the mild hit Quarantine. The script was written by the guy who wrote 30 Days of Night and Hard Candy. Now the trailers positioned this as "From the mind of M. Night Shyamalan," and this is very much an M. Night film in a lot of ways. The trappings he falls into (another layer of claustrophobia) are prevalent but under the direction of other parties the film doesn't dwell on those areas. It moves freely at spots where M. Night movies stall anymore. Even still though- this is a film that doesn't quite work enough and once you see the film there is no reason to watch it over again because it's too straight forward a film. We'll call it.
The TownRenner (The Hurt Locker) is the star here despite getting second billing. His character is the perfect antithesis to Affleck's as he doesn't want to leave his surroundings. The action set pieces work really well also with the last two robberies being exceptional pieces of tense film making. The chase through the side streets of Charlestown is especially well done. I don't know about the Oscar buzz but it is a completely solid film from start to finish. We'll call it....
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