I like it when good people succeed. By all accounts, Josh Hartnett is a good guy. As far as I know, he’s never beaten up anyone. He’s never driven drunk. He’s never freebased cocaine naked in the middle of the Golden Gate Bridge, and if he has, then I tip my hat to his crisis management team. Instead, he’s a decent person who makes a good living as an actor and is good at it.

A little research teaches me that, when Hartnett’s acting career kicked into gear during the early 2000s, he was being set up as the next big thing. Only, that’s not what he wanted. He turned down the role of Superman several times, turned down the role of Batman. When he hit the apex of his fame, he stepped away entirely for nearly two years, a lifetime in Hollywood. He did this, according to an interesting interview, to prevent his career from consuming him whole. 

Smart move. If you look at Hartnett’s filmography during the last fifteen years, you’ll see a number of small indie films, then a gradual ramping up into larger projects that remain carefully considered. He’s worked with Guy Ritchie a few times, and made an impression in the Oscar juggernaut Oppenheimer. Now he’s returned for his first high profile lead role in a minute in M. Night Shyamalan’s Trap.

You need to understand that there are two things Cooper (Josh Hartnett) loves more than life itself. The first is his family, specifically his daughter Riley (Ariel Donoghue). It’s the kind of dopey, I-can’t-believe-I-rolled-a-natural-twenty kind of love when someone has the right partner, the right kid, the right friend. Cooper simply cannot believe that this person who he’s raised is becoming a great person in her own right. It’s just awesome

The second thing Cooper loves is murdering people. His alter ego is The Butcher, a prolific Pennsylvania serial killer. So far, Cooper has slaughtered about a dozen victims. Philadelphia and the surrounding area is scared to death. The police have no idea who or where the Butcher is. Cooper simply cannot believe that he’s killed so many people and gotten away with it. It’s just awesome.

That all means Cooper’s two lives are coming up roses. He’s holding a young man captive at an undisclosed location, and when the time is right, Cooper will return to play games. He’s also scored two tickets to see Lady Raven (Saleka Shyamalan), a pop star of massive popularity and Riley’s favorite artist of all time. Does that make Cooper Dad of the Year? Other than the part where he kills people, absolutely!

Only…there’s a snag. After Cooper and Riley arrive at the stadium for Lady Raven’s concert, Cooper notices the cops. All the cops, dozens of them, along with the FBI as a treat. Cooper chats with Jamie (Jonathan Langdon), a friendly vendor. He learns the cops, led by Dr. Josephine Grant (Hayley Mills),* a whip-smart criminal profiler, has reason to believe the Butcher is somewhere within the arena. He is, and as the police close in, Cooper must find a way to escape. 

In 2002, M. Night Shyamalan appeared on the cover of Newsweek with the legend, “The Next Spielberg.” As time has passed, we’ve come to learn that Shyamalan is not the next Spielberg. He’s the first Shyamalan, filmmaker who loves gimmicks, loves twists, and has an annoyingly inconsistent filmography. When he’s really cooking, we’re treated to smart potboilers like Unbreakable, The Sixth Sense, and Split. When he’s not, we have The Happening, Lady in the Water, and The Village inflicted upon us. Watching one of his movies for the first time is like opening one of two unmarked doors. Open one and you’ll be kissed by a very attractive person. Open the other and you’ll be punched in the face.

Trap is, for two thirds of its runtime, a very strong film. Shyamalan does excellent work showing us the layout of the arena, and also the gradually tightening police presence. He merges that nicely with taut suspense and controlled pacing. Shyamalan knows that tension doesn’t matter that much if character relationships aren’t there, so he taps the brakes to let Cooper and Riley bond a little, before Cooper dashes off. He shows us Cooper thinking, improvising, constantly changing his tactics. That’s great storytelling since Shyamalan tells us what we need to know through Cooper’s actions rather than exposition dumps. 

Shyamalan writes like a director, as a friend of mine said. He likes cinematic moments, big setpieces and dramatic emotion. Unfortunately, that means the structure of this script is a little screwed up. For the majority of the film, we stick with Cooper’s POV. For a little while, we suddenly jump to Lady Raven’s POV, then to Cooper’s wife Rachel, then back to Cooper to wrap things up. That’s a problem because Shyamalan never sets up Cooper with a formidable adversary, as Dr. Grant is a woefully underwritten character. So Shyamalan cheats a bit by switching around his protagonists and antagonists. The wonky structure also means that when the film goes off the rails during the third act, Shyamalan can’t stick the landing. The script never resolves the weird father/daughter relationship in a satisfying way, likely because the most logical endings would be unbelievably dark. Would audiences accept an anti-happy ending? Perhaps, since it’s all in the execution. 

By and large, the cast is fine, but Josh Hartnett carries the whole damn movie on his back. When he’s onscreen, he effectively sells a psychopath behind the mask of a dorky dad. In his way, Cooper does love his daughter and is tickled to make one of her dreams come true. From time to time, the mask slips, and Hartnett shows us the predator wearing the sweater and barn jacket. It’s a rock solid performance, so much so that the film suffers when he’s not in it. I also liked Ariel Donoghue as Riley, who plays a regular kid who can’t help but notice her pops acting the tiniest bit strange. She’s playing a normal tween who is perceptive. Donoghue shows us simultaneously that she loves Cooper with all her heart, and can’t square his behavior. 

Unfortunately, as Dr. Grant, Hayley Mills is seriously miscast. Her character is underwritten, and she has little to do beyond monologuing over the police band. Could you imagine if a strong older actor, like a Jodie Foster or Geena Davis, had played this role and set Dr. Grant up as a serious threat for Cooper? As Lady Raven, Saleka Shyamalan isn’t bad. She did write and perform all the music, and cleverly the songs thematically match what’s going on onscreen. I don’t think she has the unearthly charisma of Taylor Swift or Beyonce, but she sells Lady Raven as a reasonably good performer.** What would this film have looked like with a budding megastar like Olivia Rodrigo, though?

To be sure, Trap has its flaws. I’d be lying to you if I said I didn’t enjoy this twisty little thriller. Josh Hartnett and, for the most part, M. Night Shyamalan acquit themselves nicely. Sometimes that’s all you can ask for.

*You’re probably wondering, “Wait, why is Hayley Mills playing that role?” Shyamalan does love his Dad jokes. Consider that Mills became a star in the 1960s playing the lead in the Disney movie…wait for it…The Parent Trap.

**My son reminds me that M. Night Shyamalan made this film from a place of absolute sincerity, and that it’s a love letter to his family.

Tim Brennan Movie Critic

Tim has been alarmingly enthusiastic about movies ever since childhood. He grew up in Boulder and, foolishly, left Colorado to study Communications in Washington State. Making matters worse, he moved to Connecticut after meeting his too-good-for-him wife. Drawn by the Rockies and a mild climate, he triumphantly returned and settled down back in Boulder County. He's written numerous screenplays, loves hiking, and embarrassed himself in front of Samuel L. Jackson. True story.