It’s been roughly a decade since M. Night Shyamalan released The Visit and essentially became respectable again, regaining a sense of acclaim that he earned earlier in his career when he was proclaimed a wunderkind based on his promising debut. He lost this status gradually over time after a run of notoriously awful films that made audiences collectively question if we were too hasty in celebrating his talents without giving him the chance to prove that The Sixth Sense wasn’t merely a fluke (although this revival in popularity has caused a substantial amount of re-evaluation of even his worst films as misunderstood masterpieces, something that may be slightly too generous), but has started to earn back his reputation as someone with a very distinct point of view and an abundance of valuable insights. His most recent effort is Trap, in which we follow a father attending a pop concert with his daughter – but we soon learn that he is a serial killer and that this entire concert is a trap designed to catch him, with the FBI and police working together to apprehend “The Butcher”, who is responsible for half a dozen deaths, and who is in the process of slowly torturing his most recent victim. As he slowly becomes aware of the lengths being taken to catch him, the killer slowly does his best to plot his escape, using his highly analytical nature, coupled with an abundance of charisma, to carefully weave his way out of this web. A work that is distinctly Shyamalan in both form and content, and one that is driven by many of his most endearing qualities that prove that he has truly returned to form in the most sincere way imaginable, Trap is a terrific film – thrilling, darkly comedic and filled to the brim with unexpected turns (while also proving that the director does not need to rely on twists as his artistic currency any longer, his recent films proving that he is more than capable of telling compelling stories without changing course midway through), it represents some of his best skills, carefully compacted together into one of the most unexpectedly delightful genre films of the year, and one that is as engrossing as it is perversely entertaining, the two working in tandem to create a truly engaging experience.

Earlier in his career, Shyamalan was the recipient of one of a common title that has proven to be both a blessing and a curse depending on which filmmaker it is given to, which is that he was proclaimed one of the heirs apparent to Alfred Hitchcock that have emerged over the decades. He has certainly not made it a secret that he adores the proverbial Master of Suspense, and his efforts to sometimes chase the director’s legacy are well-documented, at both its best and worst. Trap actually might be the closest Shyamalan has gotten to making a pure Hitchcockian film in terms of not only the story but also its execution. There are several key elements that the director brings to this film that feel like he is crafting a work that exists in dialogue with many of these more canonical works. Narratively, the events take place over the course of a single day and in very limited locations, so it hearkens back to films like Rope and Rear Window respectively, with these restrictions being done to force the director to pay attention to structure and detail, rather than being allowed to have too much freedom, particularly important considering how every detail in this film matters. Additionally, the story is defined by a very particular tone that is reminiscent of these dense, foggy psychological thrillers – the entire film is shrouded in a thick layer of suspense, through which he is able to carefully and methodically manipulate the audience into feeling a number of different emotions as we are strung along on this journey, one that is best experienced with as little prior knowledge as possible. It also helps that Shyamalan once again leans into the dark humour – the downfall of some of his more notoriously vilified films are that they are beyond self-serious and come across as preaching particular messages, not being nearly as entertaining as they could have been. As he has developed as a filmmaker, the director has lost this desire to be taken seriously through employing a dour, dull tone – instead, he crafts Trap as a vibrant, wildly entertaining dark comedy that is very much aware of its inherent humour, weaving these more eccentric elements into the fabric of the story and using this as an additional source of a very peculiar sense of discomfort that ultimately forms the primary foundation of the film and guides it forward.

One of the more intriguing qualities of Shyamalan’s work is his approach to casting – he occasionally chooses the most obvious actors for certain roles, but he mostly tends to go off the beaten track, selecting people who we may not imagine make sense in theory, but who surprise us with the depth of their performance and just how fitting they are to the material. This is primarily because these roles are written to take advantage of the actors and their inherent talents, being moulded to fit their skills, both those that are known to audiences and the ones that they had not previously showcased in the past. Josh Hartnett is an actor who was at the peak of his popularity over two decades ago, and gradually faded away into obscurity, doing middling work that barely anyone saw and seemingly becoming a remnant of the past. However, he’s slowly made a return to the mainstream, primarily in small roles that challenge him as an actor, which is refreshing considering he was never viewed as being particularly strong in the past, but rather someone who capitalized on their good looks and youthful charisma. Considering the roles for which he is both remembered and the fact that he has mainly stayed out of the limelight for years, selecting him as the lead of this film seemed like a bold swing that had the potential to backfire, since absolutely nothing about Hartnett seems to be analogous with the idea of a cold, calculating serial killer whose psychopathic urges are concealed under a thick layer of sickly sweet charm. Yet, this is the precise quality that makes his performance so remarkable – with Shyamalan, the unexpected is always his greatest asset, and drawing out such a surprisingly complex, profoundly evil performance from someone known for usually playing more heroic characters is the kind of risk that pays off in an abundance. Hartnett is remarkable, and even at the film’s most absurd, he commits entirely to the premise, delivering a spellbinding, complex performance that is deeply unnerving, unquestionably charming and often quite funny, being the perfect fit for the tempo of the film, which goes in many strange directions, but where his performance is always the anchor that keeps it from becoming too unwieldy, a great accomplishment on the part of both Hartnett and the director, who work together to create one of the more undeniably effective thriller performances of the decade.

As we would expect from the director, Trap is not a film that makes a lot of sense – in fact, there has already been a significant amount of outcry around the fact that it is a truly ludicrous film with a premise that not only approaches absurdity, it tackles it with the full brunt of its strength and almost entirely dismantles the entire concept of narrative cohesion. There are countless plot holes scattered throughout the film, and a number of narrative elements are far too easily explained without any clear sense of rational thought going into their development. Yet. anyone who has experienced Shyamalan’s work knows how logic is very rarely a priority for him. He’s the directorial equivalent of a carnival barker, someone who loudly and boldly draws attention to whatever spectacle is contained behind the curtain, knowing that it is a carefully crafted piece of artistic trickery designed to entertain and enthral, and which requires both a sense of humour and the willingness to suspend disbelief. The moment we stop searching for deeper meaning or growing frustrated over the many shortcomings of the plot, and instead start just engaging with the film at face value, which is what Shyamalan intended it to be, the sooner we can simply recede into a place of pure bliss as we allow this masterful cinematic showman to guide us through his delightfully ludicrous, off-the-wall vision. It is certainly true that Shyamalan is given much more of a free pass for being able to plaster over narrative deficiencies and leaps of logic with the supposed promise of it simply being a good time (and many other directors would be reviled for the exact same qualities), but he has shown himself as being far smarter than these accusations of laziness would suggest. The absolutely bizarre, outrageously deranged elements of Trap are not flaws, but rather features and keep the film afloat, allowing it to be this wickedly perverse, delightfully strange genre project that never once takes itself seriously enough for these criticisms to have much merit. There is a joy in finding something so utterly corrupt in terms of logic that it becomes wildly enjoyable, and the fact that Shyamalan has made it very clear that it is all intentional is a clear sign that deserves the benefit of the doubt.

Considering this new burst of acclaim he’s received, and the fact that audiences and critics have been mostly in agreement that he has massively improved over a very rough decade, it seems appropriate that we cease centring every discussion about his better films around our astonishment that he has suddenly made a return to form, and simply just remark that he’s a very gifted filmmaker that is finally doing the work that he seemed capable of when he first emerged as that rambunctious young auteur in the late 1990s, and he has more than proven himself as one of the most wildly entertaining filmmakers of his generation, even if not every one of his films is as good as the others. Trap is not a particularly revolutionary achievement, and it has its banalities and shortcomings, but it is so wickedly entertaining and purely fun, that it is exceptionally easy to overlook these elements and instead embrace the sheer absurd fun that defines this film. It’s a wickedly good time, one that is handcrafted by one of the few filmmakers working today who has been so committed to marching to the beat of his own drum to the point where his entire brand of making these inane, off-the-wall genre films that would be mangled travesties in the hands of just about any other director proves to be the foundation for some terrific films. Trap is neither revolutionary nor particularly daring in the traditional sense, but instead functions as a compelling, captivating dark comedy with an abundance of thrills and genuinely delightful elements that keep us entirely invested, and while it may still be a far cry from the best work that Shyamalan has done in the past, it does show that he still has the skills in him to make something remarkable, and that as simple as this film may seem on the surface, it remains a fast-paced, tense thriller that knows exactly how to draw us into its world, and provides nothing short of an exhilarating and wholeheartedly enjoyable experience that represents many of the director’s best qualities, showing him at his most goofy and enthralling.