Danny Boyle is an interesting director, and consistently demonstrates his capability to work with any genre. In the past, he has given us Sunshine, a futuristic science fiction story about scientists trying to reignite the sun, Slumdog Millionaire, a sappy romance set in India, and Trainspotting, a drama/comedy about drug abuse in Scotland. The one constant in all of his films, however, is the attention to the characters (except maybe in Slumdogshit Millionaire). Unfortunately, this becomes the fatal flaw of Trance, his newest film, which blends heist cinema with an unusual romantic edge.
Let’s be clear: Trance isn’t bad. It’s just fatally average. The movie stars James McAvoy as Simon, an art auctioneer who steals one of his own paintings in order to pay for his gambling debts. After getting involved with some hardened criminals (whose leader is played by Vincent Cassel) and a mysterious hypnotist (Rosario Dawson), plot twist after plot twist piles on as it so often tends to do in Boyle films. It’s pretty convoluted, but if the audience pays close attention, they will not be let down by the story itself.
The acting is very strong, especially from McAvoy. He plays confused and manipulated very well, and is one of those few actors who are able to convey a lot of emotion just from a look on their face. The movie did take a turn for the worse when we stopped rooting for him however, as he was such a likable lead that his ultimate character revealing and (spoiler alert) demise seems a little harsh. Dawson is good as well, but the romance between her and McAvoy doesn’t always work. People went into this movie expecting some mind-bending, Ocean’s Eleven-style heists, but instead they got a strange an uninvolving romance. Lame.
And by the way, character-driven dramas only work if the acting and the script are good. Unfortunately, Trance meets only one of these criteria. It’s not very well-written, making the characters a little less absorbing than they should be. Boyle was trying to give his audiences a serious and intense look at a man’s descent into madness, but when people say lines like “At last, you have repressed the memory of me,” it’s not that interesting.
However, Trance does have an interesting concept. The respect it has for the art being auctioned off makes it gain a few points in my book, and McAvoy’s obvious love for what he does is palpable in every minute of the intro. If only it had stuck with its thriller roots instead of devolving into a mindless, empty drama about a woman who wiped her boyfriend’s mind, it would have worked extremely well. Instead, it tried to go all Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on us and screw around with plot points that were either too romantic or just didn’t make any sense.
But as always, I like to hand out points for cinematography. And Trance has some GREAT camerawork. The other two films this year with trippy and engaging cinematography were Spring Breakers and Only God Forgives, two movies that were absolutely beautiful, yet mind-blowingly vapid and empty upon closer inspection. Fortunately, Trance has interesting enough characters and a mediocre script, making it far more bearable than those other two cinema-anuses. Still, visuals can’t carry a movie. But in Trance, they come close.
Final Score for Trance: 5/10 stars. Certainly passable, definitely watchable, and several steps up from Slumdog Millionaire. But for those of you looking for some classic Boyle work, you may have to look elsewhere. This movie feels almost like a time killer for Boyle to toy around with before making something truly epic. Still, I can’t fault it for being a fun little film. It just inevitably collapses under its own weight. It’s a shame, because it certainly had potential.
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