Trap (2024) Review

Coming To Terms with M. Night Shyamalan's Career in 2024

Minor Spoiler Warning: This film does contain plot details that don’t give anything away, but you might not want to know anyways. It’s fun to go into this blind, but if you know the premise, there’s not really any information that gives the film away apart from that. Proceed how you wish:

So wait, was “Split” the last film with a twist that M. Night Shyamalan has ended up making? “Glass” and “Knock at the Cabin” were incredibly straightforward from what I remember, and “Old” is surprisingly straightforward as well. I guess it’s a reveal that they were being observed,  but other than that it’s a movie about a beach that makes you old. Once again, this film is incredibly straightforward, and unlike with “Knock at the Cabin,” that fact isn’t frustrating that there’s nothing underneath the surface.

On the contrary, this film is all surface tension of a serial killer staying one step ahead of being caught the whole movie. Sometimes he’s clever, acting like Jason Bourne at times in problem solving, acting brazen at other times, like how he walks through a crowded room of swat people, to him acting like a cornered rat, and losing control. You’re obviously rooting for this guy to get caught, but M. Night does a really solid job at keeping up the tension of the whole film.

The only things I brushed up against was some of the more ridiculous leaps we’re supposed to buy in order to string the tension out, like how he gets out of the limo when it’s surrounded, or how he’s able to swipe something, while multiple people are looking directly at him. I get it, if you know what you’re doing, you can get away with a lot in plain sight, like what a magician does, but I thought that could have been shown better in certain cases. Then again, are you really watching an M. Night movie if it doesn’t contain some silly dialogue exchanges and plot holes? 

After all, the whole thing with this guy’s career is when he’s on as a filmmaker, which he is in “Sixth Sense,” “Signs,” “The Village,” etc., you’re willing to forgive his eccentricities because he can be so undeniably good as a filmmaker he creates that cinemagic of holding you in the palm of his hand. But when M. Night was in his wilderness period of having lost the audience, and having become a punchline of himself, it was hard to get past all his quirks and baggage.

Thing is, as becomes more clear as he makes more films, he is both filmmakers. He can be an expert at crafting tension, or he can oversee a laughable mess. He’s never been consistent. We like to think he was once consistent, but that’s only if you think his career started with “Sixth Sense,” and then he fell off after “The Village.” But “Sixth Sense” wasn’t his debut film, it was his third film. We just want it to be his debut film, because the two independent dramas he made before that were absolute dogshit.

No, with the films of M. Night Shyamalan, you never know what you’re truly going to get, especially since every single film he’s made has wildly differing reactions depending on who you ask. More than most any other modern director, you’re going to get a lot of varied answers to what his filmography ranking is. Even the ones you’d think everybody agrees is bad, I’ve heard defenses of films like “Lady in the Water” and even “The Last Airbender.” I haven’t heard a defense for “After Earth” yet, but more on that film later…

I loved “Old,” while a lot of people hated that movie. A lot of people liked “Knock at the Cabin,” I strongly did not care for it, or “Split,” which really revitalized his career commercially. It turns out M. Night will just forever be one of those director who you never know what you’re going to get with him, but it’s at least going to be interesting, which “Trap” very much is, no matter where you come down on it.

Going back to “After Earth,” that was famously the absolute nadir of Shyamalan’s career not only from a quality standpoint, but by also how much of a box office bomb that film was. What stung even more for him was it wasn’t even his film really. He’s credited as director, but that film was entirely a nepo baby vehicle for Will Smith to make Jaden Smith a star, which failed miserably.

After having a front row seat for that, you would think M. Night would be more cautious in following a similar path, but here we are and in the summer of 2024, and two out of his three kids have gotten prominent spotlights! Ishana Night Shyamalan made her directorial debut with a film called “The Watchers,” a film produced and largely funded by her father. And in this film we have Saleka Shyamalan doing the entire soundtrack, and basically playing the third lead of this film, as the Taylor Swift-esque pop star?

For Ishana, her film was a box office disappointment, mainly because has most of the common Shyamalan filmmaking quirks and stupidity, with none of her dad’s talent. Saleka on the other hand comes out surprisingly well. Not with her music, that’s extremely forgettable. But as an actress, when she gets pulled into being a main focus of the plot, I thought she actually did quite well. She has a very expressive face reminiscent of Mia Goth, and her acting for her spotlight moments is actually engaging. I was impressed.

Finally, I will leave off by reiterating the joke that Haley Mills is brilliant casting in this film, as she’s known for her work in the original “Parent Trap,” and here she’s not only in a movie called “Trap,” but it’s a movie where the trap is set in order to catch a parent. Bravo, M. Night. Bravo.

3.5/5 Stars

⭐️⭐️⭐️✨

Currently Ranked:

#5/#16 in “M. Night Shyamalan, Ranked”