M. Night Shyamalan’s “Trap” is honest summer entertainment

A quarter of a century after “The Sixth Sense”, which revealed him to the (very) general public, M. Night Shyamalan returns with “Trap”, released on August 7.

After being the new golden boy of Hollywood in the 2000s thanks to his successes Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, Signs And The VillageM. Night Shyamalan then baffled critics, and sometimes audiences. But he never stopped filming, and his recent films, more compact, quickly made, crafty, and less expensive, have continued to bring in money. He still has that directorial touch and that particular look.

This is the case again here, with Trap. The story is both simple and very enticing on paper: the concert of a pop superstar, in a large venue in Philadelphia, to which a father-daughter duo goes who sometimes have trouble communicating. She is a teenager, uncomfortable in her own skin and a fan of Lady Raven, the singer. He is a firefighter in real life, but we quickly learn that he leads a double life, becoming a fearsome serial killer at night. An impressive police presence is set up in and around the venue to apprehend him. Then begins a jubilant game of cat and mouse during the concert.

The entire part in the theater, more than half of the film, is undoubtedly the most successful. We feel that the director is having a field day multiplying the twists and turns and false leads. But once the main characters are moved to another place, in its last third, the film loses a lot of its flavor.

On the casting side, Saleka Shyamalan, the director’s own daughter, represents a first nice surprise. She plays the singer, with about ten songs that she wrote and composed herself. She also does very well in the acting register. In the main role, we find a certain Josh Hartnett, a handsome guy seen in The Virgin Suicides Or Pearl Harbor 20 years ago he had moved away from the Hollywood glitz, but he is making a comeback after Oppenheimer by Christopher Nolan. His performance in Trap often oscillates between the convincing and the excessive. Upon arrival, Trap is a bit of a wobbly film, but still a fairly honest piece of entertainment.