Cooper (Josh Hartnett) takes his daughter, Riley (Ariel Donoghue), to a sold-out Lady Raven (Saleka Shyamalan) concert with great seats only a few rows away from the stage.  In line for a tee-shirt, Cooper asks one of the employees why all of the heightened security at the event and he is told that the police caught a tip that a notorious serial killer, “The Butcher,” will be at the concert tonight and they plan to capture him. 

The ever-busy M. Night Shyamalan writes and directs Trap for Warner Brothers, a 105-minute thriller that also serves as a promotion for his daughter, Saleka’s, musical career.  While the singer gets a lot of time in the spotlight, Shyamalan remains committed to telling a story through his film first and foremost.   

Since the trailer premiered at CinemaCon, much has been said that the marketing appeared to give away the twist that Cooper is The Butcher.  While this discourse will have fizzled out for audiences catching this film later on down the line, and even though this plot point is delivered within the first twenty or so minutes, it leaves its first window audiences just waiting for the reveal so the film can actually begin to build towards something.  Shamalan, to his credit, does transition the narrative to something more robust, but the script feels rushed and it never quite gets to the level which we want to see one of our twistiest auteurs to be working at.  This is most evident in the beguiling dialogue that feels as if it is a parody of itself but it is not funny or cheeky enough to honestly be seen as such, and this bonkers tone flows into many of the actions and setups that are a bridge to far into incredulity.  Without being able to believe that any of these scenarios have even the slightest chance of playing out as they do, there is very little tension in the moment.

The entire cast struggles to deliver their lines, but the biggest victim of the script is also its star.  Hartnett is doing a lot here as a goofy, dorky, girl dad trying to connect with his daughter, and while elements of the performance work in some scenes, those same elements seem almost alien in other scenes.  Beyond the little white lies Cooper tells to save his skin and get in and out of certain situations, he is more of an unreliable narrator tonally than plot-wise because we never quite know how to take him.  It feels like Shamalyn tried to make Cooper the kind of everyman whose crimes would shake and sour a neighborhood who thought that it could never happen here, but he overworks the character and it is anyone’s guess if Harnett was working under direction or doing his own thing, but the two sides of this performance are constantly at odds with itself and that disparity weakens the entire experience.  

Thankfully the surrounding cast are able to pull the film together because they are not responsible for the entire thing.  Beyond Cooper, Lady Raven occupies the next biggest role as the global superstar able to sell out arenas packing them full of screaming teenage girls and their trying-to-be-hip parents.  Saleka understandably has the stage presence to pull off this role, but for those that fall outside of Riley’s demographic, it makes for a rough sit during the concert scenes with the fake-deep philosophy, the sea of cell phone flashlights, and incoherent screaming of the fans.  Basically, the film highlights all of the worst aspects of live music for the first half of its runtime. While the film serves as a good promotion for her music, the script does not allow her to flex as an actor between the stunted dialogue and wild, nonsensical plot points. 

Trap is an incredibly frustrating film to watch, but by and large, Shyamalan is still able to tease out tension in what can be called a deconstructed cat-and-mouse game in the back half of his story.  It never quite builds on itself, but the individual sequences are all quite enjoyable.  In the front half, Shyamalan finds ways to let Cooper creep through all sorts of restricted areas of the stadium, but it relies on a streak of consistent convenience which gives a Teflon quality to Cooper like he can not be stopped.  This endless cycle eventually wears thin and we grow tired of it, which is why the escape from the stadium works so well and re-energizes the film with something new and jolting.  Oftentimes, these stories grow smaller as the walls close in on the unsub, but Shyamalan opens up the world and then the fear is not so much will Cooper be caught but reframes it as will Cooper get away. 

Not only does the world of the film open up in the third act, but so does the cast which injects some new energy into what has quickly become stale.  Bringing the narrative to Cooper’s house where his wife Rachel (Alison Pill) and son Logan (Lochlan Miller) are waiting is a really smart move.  In doing so, Cooper’s two lives have crossed, something he was always careful to avoid, and this is the drama that drives the film.  As the tea kettle begins to scream, Pill steals the show in a heartbreaking monologue culminating in a thrillingly orchestrated finale.  There is so much around her – the boiling kettle, the kitchen knives – and the story she tells is one wracked with guilt that we are never quite sure if she will attack her husband, or maybe the twist is that she wants to join him. It is thrilling and exciting, and thankful Harnett has dropped his goober act and is actually presenting like the menace here which the film has spent its runtime telling us he is. Shamalyn is often criticized for botching the ending, but here the ending is the most calibrated section of the film. 

In a dormant box office that is about to be dominated by Disney between Inside Out 2 (2024), Deadpool & Wolverine (2024), and Moana 2 (2024), Trap should be celebrated as an original idea that penetrated through the IP slog secured a wide release, but Shyamalan has gotten in his own way again preventing the film from breaking through the noise of nostalgia and becoming the sensation that he is capable of crafting.  It is still a return to form for the director who has always been interested in crafting twisting, original narratives, sure, but it has a silly quality that runs counter to the thriller which is what shapes the narrative.  Trap, as well as most of his recent output, proves that his best days are not totally behind him, but he seems to be getting high on his own supply, and in order to reach the incredible frequency of his releases, his product has been suffering.  In this way, Shyamalan continues to be one of our most addictive and frustrating filmmakers working today because he has some great ideas, but in a race against himself, he rushes to finish and does not always put out his best work. One thing we will always see coming in the latest film from M. Night Shyamalan are interesting and unique ideas at the very least.