Well now that Valentine's Day is officially over, I figured I will take a small break from love stories and talk about a film that brings a whole meaning to mesmerizing from start to finish. Trance is a film noir type crime mystery that came out ten years ago and really was one of those films that was just lost in the shuffle of things especially movies that came out in America, basically one of those films that I found in a Hastings bookstore on Blu-Ray (ANYONE REMEMBER HASTINGS BOOKSTORE?). And I recognized some likable actors in James McAvoy, Rosario Dawson and French success Vincent Cassel, furthermore, watching the movie through this was no doubt one of the most shocking and surprising mystery films I've seen in quite a long time.
Simon (James McAvoy), a fine auctioneer, joins a gang of thieves led by Frank (Vincent Cassel) to steal a priceless Goya painting. During the heist suffers a head injury and awakens with no memory of where he hid the artwork. When torture and physical threats fail to break through his amnesia, Frank hires a hypnotherapist named Elizabeth (Rosario Dawson) to find the answer. But as Elizabeth probes the recesses of Simon's mind, the lines between truth and deceit start to blur.
I can honestly say I've seen this movie multiple times and just can stop but be at awed with the movie from start to finish, especially when it comes to moments that appear shocking like you didn't expect or something that is just you can let go of your own phone and just pay attention till the final frame, even when it comes to the attention to details. The development of Trance I'm surprised to hear has been going on long before it was green lit, after Danny Boyle (won best director for Slumdog Millionaire) finished with Shallow Grave in 1994, writer Joe Ahearne sent Boyle his screenplay to Trance, seeking Boyle's encouragement. Boyle in his own words thought the project would be "quite difficult" for a beginning screenwriter, and so Ahearne would later turn his script into a British Television movie back in 2001 and like most writers and directors through the decades Boyle contacted Ahearne about officially turning it into a feature film, and so with the help of another writer John Hodge who constructed the screenplay, the rest became history. To me what I loved about the movie is that it reminds me so much of the 1962 film The Manchurian Candidate, although this film has nothing to do with brainwashing it does dive deep into hypnotism and true both mind control concepts are much different when use, but there is that similarity of diving deep into a memory you want to remember or forget moreover Trance does have that unique blend of shock and horror at the same time especially when you're not sure what is real and what is not. James McAvoy really shines in the movie as a regular man who seems harmless moreover trying to be this man who is trying to make money by stealing a painting but through the course of the movie you begin to see that McAvoy's character isn't who you'd as an audience member would think he would be and McAvoy does a fantastic job through the course of the movie peeling back the layers of his character to understand who he truly is. Rosario Dawson who I've always in a sense had a crush growing up from movies like Josie and the Pussycats (long story) Clerks 2, Rent and Sin City, furthermore when I watch a movie where she does an excellent job at playing the typical film noir, femme-fatale that is always a deceitful person but with this movie you slowly begin to understand her motives. Now, there have been a lot of movies through the past decade that have been collecting dust or just stuck on the shelf already to be forgotten, and Trance is one of those movies that needs to be seen to the whole world because it has that element like a film noir that takes you on this journey of mystery but filled with a lot of surprises along the way and sure there have been a lot of Danny Boyle's films that are considered classics but this is one of these films that needs that spotlight of recognition for many reasons it has everything from the darkness of crime to the girls and even the colorful set designs along the way. Look, what I'm trying to say is that ten years of existence and this movie is still fresh and amazing to watch towards the final frame and I would strongly recommend watching this amazing tribute to all the Hitchcock films as well as the film noir genre.
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