Directed by:
Danny BoyleCinematography:
Anthony Dod MantleComposer:
Rick SmithCast:
James McAvoy, Vincent Cassel, Rosario Dawson, Tuppence Middleton, Sam Creed, Danny Sapani, Matt Cross, Simon Kunz, Spencer Wilding, Michael Shaeffer (more)VOD (1)
Plots(1)
A fine art auctioneer mixed up with a gang joins forces with a hypnotherapist to recover a lost painting. As boundaries between desire, reality and hypnotic suggestion begin to blur the stakes rise faster than anyone could have anticipated. (Fox Searchlight Pictures US)
Videos (33)
Reviews (11)
An overcooked start. There is a voiceover, an unreliable narrator, an attractive plot, and expensive art. After twenty minutes, only a hint of the original idea remains, which surprisingly, even by Danny Boyle's standards, fails to reach a sufficiently high level with its piercing visual and thunderous musical accompaniment. I am all for surprising twists or the denial of clichés through lively passion. However, all of this must not happen at the expense of the viewer's engagement.
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Danny Boyle is a director whose work cannot be overlooked. He handles the craft perfectly, he is creative and playful, and able to surprise us with technical tricks and film effects. Whether he works in any genre, he can create an impressive spectacle and his directing skills often overshadow weak screenplay foundations and outweigh banal subject matter. Trance is, at first glance, a crime film about a heist that, after the initial success, gets stuck and turns into a nightmare for its participants. The heist was successful, but the question remained: where is the loot, who is trying to blind everyone, who is being manipulated by whom, and who is pulling the strings? Although I understood that Boyle was primarily playing with me as a viewer, I easily engaged in the game and I can say for myself that I enjoyed it probably more than all three of Danny's previous films combined. For the average summer movie theatergoer, Boyle's thriller is probably too complicated, resembling a complex strategic board game where most players expect a lively party game without excessive mental strain. However, I very much enjoyed all the twists where the view of the earlier plot and its actors fundamentally changed, and I don't mind that in reality, hypnosis wouldn't work like this. In my opinion, Trance is one of the few films that can be enjoyed repeatedly and even appreciated more during subsequent screenings. Overall impression: 95%.
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Danny Boyle is simply awesome. Trance is not his best movie, but it doesn’t change the fact that he is able to film literally anything. He had fun with the camera in a drug lair, in an Indian slum, near the Sun, with millions in his suitcase or he sweated for 127 hours in the mountains and this time for a change hypnosis plays a major role, and we see an entanglement of the whole story with the aim of preparing a shocking finale. And he succeeded. The movie may be a little too dynamic and a bit complicated, but that’s simply Boyle and that’s why I like him so much. The whole movie really has guts and every five minutes there is something happening that turns the story upside down. If you can accept that, you will be satisfied.
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Knock! Knock! Knock! A cute crime movie, cut precisely to suit today’s fashion. It’s just that hypnosis isn’t so central as PR tried to imply and the painting isn’t absolutely what this is about. Sanity, lies, anger, love and hate. Boyle mixed this cocktail following his own traditional recipe and his signature is apparent in almost every shot (the beaker thrown at the camera), maybe the trailers gave away too much. Cassel excellent, Rosario Dawson super smooth and McAvoy masterfully swaps roles and is the inconspicuous puppet master of the entire Trance. Delightful and not completely stupid. Rick Smith supervised the creation of the first-rate music.
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After a second viewing, I had to go one star lower with my rating, because what I found original at first turned out to be annoying the second time around. I mean the endless series of big reveals that had me going around in circles for so long that it almost felt like having been hypnotized and put on a swing ride. Of the big revelations, the most interesting turned out to be the one delivered by Rosario Dawson. I liked Tuppence Middleton though only in a mini role, and McAvoy's slimy smile still haunts me at night.
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