Oscar winner Danny Boyle is considered one of the most versatile film workers in the genre, who can easily direct everything from horror to tense monodrama to Bollywood soap operas. “Trance” is his latest project, which, with much less money invested in shooting than the average Hollywood movie, provides solid entertainment, which is still not in the range of Boyle’s previous projects.
The shop follows Simon, a worker at elite art auctions who is involved in the robbery of Goja’s exclusive painting. The villain moves in the wrong direction and Simon gets hit in the head which creates amnesia for him and forgets where he hid the picture. Frank, the leader of the gang, decides to take him to a psycho-therapist who practices hypnosis in order to break through the barrier that creates amnesia with her help. She enters his mind and slowly discovers the real reasons for the robbery and the details from the past that make her an accomplice.
The first impression after watching the movie is – confusion. I didn’t know how long it lasted, but I thought it was at least two hours long because the store was developing quite slowly. Suddenly, within five minutes, the outcome unfolds and the check-out rush starts. A large number of things have not been fully explained and it can be freely said that the script is not written well enough. The beginning promises a great film, but the very course of the rather vague action spoils the impression, and in the end the viewer finds himself in a bizarre world without a clear boundary of what is real and what is fictional.
The characterization of the characters themselves is done rather sloppily. They are totally immoral, impersonal, do not leave an impression, nor are they interesting. Their better elaboration would definitely contribute to the quality of the film, but that, unfortunately, was not the case. He also complains about the fact that the very beginning promises action whose central theme is robbery, while over time it turns into a relatively uninteresting love story.
Boyle is a master of working with cameras and he shows that in this film as well. It has great editing, great photography and a soundtrack that is completely connected to the action that takes place on the screen at that time. However, although it is excellently done from the technical side, it cannot be said that it leaves an impression that will be retold and it is far behind Boyle’s earlier works. It can best be described as a much worse version of Inception.
Acting in the film is the strong point. Although the characters themselves are not very interesting, the cast did a solid job to improve the impression. The main trio are the solid James McAvoy, then one of the best European actors of today, Vincent Cassel, while the female side is held by the enchanting Rosario Dawson, with one scene that will especially appeal to the male audience.
This project definitely has elements and possibilities that would make it a top film experience, but due to insufficient effort, it turns out to be extremely vague and pretentious. It is far from a film catastrophe, it is interesting and technically flawlessly done, but a deeper study reveals more and more illogicalities and poorly executed ideas that spoil the experience. Everything could have been much better.
