Review: Panic Room

Jodie Foster, recently divorced from wealthy ex-husband Patrick Bauchau, moves into an expensive, spacious Manhattan home with her daughter Kristen Stewart (who originally I thought was a boy!). The house comes equipped with one eccentric special feature added by its paranoid former owner- the ‘safe’ haven of the film’s title, intended as a hiding place from unwanted intruders. The panic room is steel-protected, and practically impossible to break into, as well as having its own ventilation system and a phone line not connected to the house’s main line. On their first night in their new home, wouldn’t you know it? Three men (Financially struggling security guy Forest Whitaker, ‘man with the plan’ Jared Leto, and unpredictable goon Dwight Yoakam) break into the house and unfortunately for Foster and Stewart, hiding in the panic room is the worst thing they could do. What these guys want, is in that room! Worse still, Whitaker’s line of work is in the installation of such security measures. What follows is a cat-and-mouse game as the robbers try and get the duo out of the room, but can they even really trust each other? A bitchy Ann Magnuson and snooty soap opera actor Ian Buchanan have hilarious cameos as real estate agents.

 

This 2002 David Fincher (“Se7en”, “Fight Club”, the underappreciated “Alien ³”) ‘high concept’ crime-thriller received pretty good reviews at the time and good box-office. I reckon it’s one of the most atmospheric, suspenseful, and visually dynamic thrillers of the 00s. In fact, whilst not a horror film, today’s horror hacks could really learn a thing or two from Fincher about atmosphere, tension, and suspense. So far as mainstream ‘sell-out’ movies are concerned, this is one that Mr. Fincher certainly shouldn’t be ashamed of. Not every film has to be a nuanced, thought-provoking masterpiece, and “Panic Room” sure as hell isn’t that kind of film. It’s a thrill ride and a bloody entertaining one.

 

The film starts wonderfully, with impressive title design and an awesomely attention-grabbing score by Howard Shore (“Scanners”, “Silence of the Lambs”, “The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers”) that combined, give off a definite Hitchcock vibe, particularly “North by Northwest”. Sometimes an oppressive score can prove overstated and irritating, but Shore’s work here is for me, one of the biggest strengths. It’s also a film that begins with characters making blunders, and then having them spend the rest of the film trying to adapt to the situation resulting from those blunders. One side is obviously going to come out better at the end than the other. For the character played by Jodie Foster, those blunders are not connecting the phone line to the panic room straight away, and not entirely familiarising herself with the panic room as much as she perhaps should have. For the baddies, there’s the mixed-up dates for when Foster was supposed to move in, there’s also Jared Leto’s character, a seemingly bottomless pit of rash and foolish decisions, such as bringing in the clearly unstable Yoakam for the job. After these initial mistakes, the characters try their best to cope with the mess they’re in, but with wildcard Yoakam and the volatile Leto to work with, you gotta feel for Whitaker a bit. He’s a fairly bright guy stuck with a couple of complete idiots, but then again he shouldn’t be doing this in the first place, should he? Foster, meanwhile, comes with a diabetic kid (a pre-“Twilight” Stewart, proving her one-note sullen schtick was evident early) that presents its own hurdles. The latter presents the only real issue in the film for me (aside from Bauchau’s thankless and ultimately useless role), it’s too much of a time-worn cliché for my liking, though it’s corny enough that it still kinda made me grin. However, the screenplay by David Koepp (“Death Becomes Her”, “Jurassic Park”) is not at all stupid, and for every loophole or cliché you might spot, there are instances where Koepp has given us something quite interesting and even intelligent. Whitaker, for instance, wants to leave early on due to the house being occupied and Leto hiring Yoakam without prior warning. However, his own desperate personal situation, with the promise of loot inside the house, and his own personal experience with panic rooms, keeps him from fleeing even when stuck with a couple of morons for cohorts. And then there’s a wonderful, intelligent scene between Foster and a cop (Paul Schulze) who comes knocking whilst the crims are still inside. I won’t spoil how it plays out, but suffice to say it’s a most credible scene under the white-knuckle genre movie circumstances (it’s an uber-tense scene). It’s both well-written and well-acted by Foster and Schulze. The very premise is actually a clever (high) concept, the one place that was built to keep people safe from intruders is the one room that the baddies need to get to. Koepp comes up with a plausible solution for the baddies in trying to carry out their impossible task of getting inside that supposedly impenetrable room (which I will not divulge). Koepp also does some fine, economical work on the characters that some might suggest leads to stereotype, but for me it suits the stripped-down, economical vibe of the plot. This film is a thrill ride, not a high class, stirring drama, and I for one think Hitchcock would’ve loved this film. Koepp gives us enough characterisation to get the job done and allows a fine cast to bring their own schtick to give just that little bit more. For instance, we get a brief scene early on that I think is key- It’s where we get the exposition and back-story to the characters, and Foster’s divorce. It’s not a long scene, but it’s enough to get us involved with these characters, as they are going through something identifiable- a divorce. The fact that Foster is playing a wealthy, intellectual New Yorker isn’t that much of a turn-off, as a result because Koepp (and Foster, in a rock-solid performance) humanise her. Hey, wealthy people have problems too! And if she weren’t wealthy, she couldn’t have afforded the house and there’d be no damn movie.

 

The villains, for their part are an entertaining “Treasure of Sierra Madre” bunch. Whitaker plays the reluctant bad guy better than just about anyone I can think of, and is a good match for Foster. Leto, with his ridiculously inappropriate corn-rows is the hissable loudmouth so obnoxious and clearly yellow-bellied, that we can’t wait for him to get his comeuppance. And when he does, it’s a pretty amusing scene indeed, especially for people who aren’t Jared Leto fans normally. For me the surprise was Yoakam. I really liked his a-hole turn in “Sling Blade”, but he’s downright creepy here. He’s clearly having a whale of a time playing a guy with a detached, sinister cool veneer (especially when he’s wearing the mask) but also someone violent and volatile. Things get even more darkly humorous when we find out that he’s actually not all that much more intelligent than Leto (if that). And he’s the one who brought the gun! Needless to say this leads to some great interplay between the three. My favourite moment, though, is when Whitaker asks Yoakam who the hell he thinks he is, and Yoakam’s deadpan reply? ‘I’m Raoul!’. Priceless, just priceless. Yoakam is deadpan funny and scary at the same time.

 

As I mentioned earlier, the film is extremely tense and atmospheric. It isn’t a horror film, but Fincher and cinematographer Conrad W. Hall (“Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”, “American Beauty”, “Road to Perdition”), treat this story as though it were “The Haunting”, with a camera constantly on the move throughout the huge house. Early on we get an eerie, nervous vibe even before the crooks show up, even before we know it’s a crime-thriller and not a horror film. It gives the film an edge that it would not otherwise have had in another filmmaker’s hands. I particularly loved the awesome (and presumably CGI-assisted) shot going over several counters/benches and towards the door. I mean, David Fincher really needs to take this technique and go and make a Gothic horror film. By the way, Darius Khondji (“The City of Lost Children”, “Se7en”) is also credited as cinematographer but it’s really Hall’s work as Khondji left two weeks into principal photography. The early passages of the film are almost sickeningly tense and atmospheric, and that’s before we get to the claustrophobic confines of the panic room. Fincher really does do a masterful job of ratcheting up the tension and unease within a fairly large, expansive house, making us feel claustrophobic and ill at ease before we even really should be.

 

From a cinematography and directorial standpoint, I will go on record as saying this is one of the most impressive films of its decade. It’s also a well-acted, amusing, scary, and highly entertaining crime-thriller. Cute voice cameo by Nicole Kidman (who had to turn down the Foster role due to a nagging injury), too, though I’m not sure how many people will pick up on it.

 

Rating: B+