A Hugh Jackman Thriller Is The #1 Movie On Netflix
Hugh Jackman’s 2013 movie Prisoners is the number one movie on Netflix this week, nearly 10 years after the film’s original release. The thriller was added to the streaming service on December 11 and has quickly risen to the number one spot, replacing Bullet Train. The story, it seems, is just as engaging today as it was 10 years ago.
Prisoners is the fifth film by director Denis Villeneuve of Dune and Blade Runner 2049 fame. The film tells the story of a desperate father, Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman), and his search for his missing daughter. Six-year-old Anna and her friend have disappeared without a trace and the only lead is a witness account of an old RV and little else.
Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) investigates the disappearance to a frustrating end. Loki finds the RV owner (Paul Dano) but is bound by the limitations of the law. Dover feels he has no choice but to take drastic action on his own to find his daughter and bring her home.
Unlike many thrillers that depend on a family dynamic, Prisoners does not begin with an idyllic scene of a happy family. The film opens with a tense and heavy scene and maintains that weight for the rest of the film. The ambiance is cold, colorless, and dreary.
Hugh Jackman’s character is a caricature of an American dad. He loves Bruce Springsteen, hunting, and the national anthem. Dover is portrayed as a doomsday prepper with a hoard of shelf-stable food, weapons, and survival gear.
Jackman delivers an enraged, screaming performance throughout the film. He demonstrates the character’s weakness: blind rage. Dover cannot see through his grief and certainty that the RV owner knows what happened to his daughter.
The film does a good job of using visual cues to further moods. Constant interruptions to shots, like characters moving through frames, emphasize the characters’ isolation in the story.
Hugh Jackman’s character and his wife are consumed with grief and seem to live in different realities. The distraught father feels abandoned by the law, which failed to protect his daughter. Each character travels the plot alone, and the cinematography drives it home.
Each character is trapped in their own prison. The filmmakers use creative set design to emphasize the constantly cramped feeling of being in a cell. Prisoners may be heavy-handed and take itself too seriously, but it is great at driving home a point.
Hugh Jackman is convincing enough as an unhinged grieving father, but the performance is slightly oversold. Overall, most critics agree that the film is satisfying and engaging, even so many years after its release. Prisoners clearly made an impact on fans with its haunting story.
The film takes a long, hard look at acceptance, fate, faith, and doubt. An open-ended conclusion leaves viewers to do some minor lifting. Like the characters in the story, they must decide whether to have faith.
The interpretive nature of Prisoners gives it an edge over other thrillers. This Hugh Jackman hit is number one on Netflix because it allows viewers to create their own conclusions. The message of Prisoners is up to each viewer to decide.
