Buried
Buried takes the ultimate high concept and becomes one of the best thrillers of the year.
In an astoundingly brave move for both actor Ryan Reynolds and director Rodrigo Cortes, Buried takes the ultimate high concept and becomes one of the best thrillers of the year.
For Buried is literally Reynolds in a coffin for 95 minutes. No flashbacks, no outside world - just the dirty, sweaty, palpable horror of waking up in a coffin and the potential of being stuck there until the oxygen runs out. Cortes' vision of Chris Sparling's script is so bold, he doesn't need take it down the talky stagey route. US contractor Paul Conroy (Reynolds) doesn't even have time to ponder over his desperate situation, as we are in fill-blown action mode - within the confines of a 6ft wooden coffin. Comparisons with Alfred Hitchcock's ingenuity are justified, for Buried is a technical tour de force, using varied light sources - a dodgy flashlight, a mobile phone, a lighter - and deft camera work for a strikingly photographed piece of work.
If there are any doubts as to whether Cortes can sustain the premise for a feature, they are allayed within the superb opening ten minutes. A pitch black screen intensifies Reynold's every breath, and his awakening and realisation is gutwrenching. The frustration of his situation leads to some exasperating yet guiltily humorous moments, the best example of which is his futile 911 call. For Conroy's last waking moment was during his job as a truck driver in Iraq, and the phone on his person is not his own. Eventually able to communicate with the outside world, he frantically has to piece together what has happened to him with rapidly diminishing air, battery life and the will to live.
It's a huge gamble for any filmmaker to pull off a concept so difficult. The dread of being buried alive is a centuries-old fear, but the act itself has only made heartstopping cameos in movies. To have it as your unique selling point, you'd better have a great lead, a vision like no other or a compelling script. Buried gets about two and a half out of the three, for the only potential stumbling block to five-star greatness are the conversations with the outside world. For Reynolds has immersed us so fully in his agony, the almost clinically cold voices on "the other side" are distracting. Don't expect too many twists and turns in the done-to-death kidnapping plot, as the terrorist protest is mundanely real - an actual strength, to be honest, and one that keeps Conroy's ordeal all the more convincing. Not only one man's hell, it's also a darkly comical look at beaurocracy.
It's a beautiful thing in cinema when an actor is allowed to do something a little bit dangerous, and the casting of Reynolds is inspired. The handsome and chiselled star of various romcoms goes through the wringer emotionally, and is not afraid to show devastating fear. It's a quietly controlled performance - he is literally the everyman as there are no heroics, or histrionics for that matter. But this is Cortes' moment of glory, crafting a sweat-inducing claustrophic nightmare in a fiendishly clever way. Bleakly unforgettable, literally breathtaking and visually stunning - how many directors can boast that achievement in a wooden box?
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