Buried

Being a bit of a claustrophobe myself, my palms were sweaty at the thought of spending two hours trapped in a coffin with Ryan Reynolds. That might appeal to some of our female readers out there, but for me it sounded like a little slice of Hell on earth. I get nervous during cave sequences in video games, for chrissakes. The idea of shooting an entire film inside of such a confined space is something we've heard of before. Some might recall a flick from a few years ago called Phone Booth.. A better example would be the inky darkness of  Kill Bill vol. 2 when The Bride is buried alive. Or Alfred Hitchcock's Lifeboat.Take that idea, amp up the tension and the stakes, and you've got Buried. The first real chance for Ryan Reynolds to show off that he's more than just a smirk and a pair of abs. Even though he gives his finest performance to date, for some reason I can't help but feel as if it wasn't as intimidating an experience as it should've been.

Paul Conroy is in a bit of a predicament. He's just woken up from unconsciousness to find himself trapped in a box barely bigger than himself.  He's got a lighter, a mostly charged up cell phone, and not a heck of a lot of breathable air. After freaking out, Paul makes desperate calls to the outside world to try and find help. You know what he runs into? Ever try to call for a little computer tech support and you get some guy you can't understand and who can't understand you? Frustrating, isn't it? Now imagine that your life is on the line. How mad would you be?

Part of the fun of the early going is the mystery surrounding Paul's situation. Why is he there? Where is he? Who is Paul? Did he do something to deserve all this? Holding on to some of those pertinent questions might've served the story better, but we get the answers fairly easily. Without spoiling too much, it has to do with the war in Iraq. Not exactly the venue where you'd expect to hear cogent analysis on our presence in the Middle East, but it's weaved into the story pretty seamlessly. 

Crafting a compelling story set in one place with only one actor might seem challenging, yet writer Chris Sparling pulls every rabbit out of his hat to keep the tension mounting. The worst things that could happen do happen, nothing is spared. Got a thing about snakes? You won't feel any better about them after this.  Director Rodrigo Cortes has the heaviest burden other than Reynolds, and it's his handling of the camera that bugs me the most. Reynolds is great at portraying the restricting effects of his makeshift prison, but far too often it was hard to tell exactly what he was doing because of some seriously awkward camera positioning. Cortes couldnt' exactly pan out, otherwise he'd lose the entire effect of us being trapped with Reynolds. At the same time Cortes and Reynolds seem to be in some weird conflict every time the actor has to actually do something other than dial on his phone.

And therein lies the biggest problem. Essentially this a movie where Ryan Reynolds talks on his phone for 2 hours. There's never much of an attempt made to actually escape. The situation might be dire and possibly hopeless, but at some point you gotta make a genuine effort. If the guy trapped in the box isn't all that fired up about escape, why should I be? I was interested in seeing how the situation played out, but not necessarily in how it gets there. As good Reynolds is at making the subtle transition from anger to despair and back again(the guy runs the gamut of emotions), not everything surrounding the situation feels authentic. There are too many times where the story looks for laughs when it's not really a funny situation in the least. Tying it into the Iraq war makes it less comedic.

Buried is a novel concept, one that I hope we see more of in the future. What I'm afraid of most is that I'll get overconfident and keep attending claustrophobic flicks like this until somebody finally gets it right and scares me right out of the theater like a wimp. Buried could've been it, and in a lot of ways it comes pretty close, but close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.