Movie: Trap (2024) Caution Spoiler Alert

 Trap

Came out; 2024

Time; 1 hour 45 Minutes

Watched: Amazon

Rated: PG-13 for some violent content and brief strong language

IMDB Rating; 6.0/10

Rotten Tomatoes:

Tomato Meter 57%

Popcorn Meter 65%

Caution; Spoiler Alert

Staring.

Josh Hartnett as Cooper

Ariel Donoghue as Riley

Saleka Shyamalan as Lady Raven

Alison Pill as Rachel

Hayley Mills as Dr. Josephine Grant

Story Line.

In M. Night Shyamalan's latest outing, everyone in a large city is in a frenzy. Why? That's because they're up and ready to watch a concert performed by famous pop star Lady Raven. Two of her fans, a man named Cooper and his daughter Riley, attend the concert with high spirits, but things slowly begin to change their tune. Amongst the screams of adoration and sounds of applause, the concert itself has a hidden identity: a front to fish out an infamous serial killer known as The Butcher. With security cameras rigged, armies of policemen with weapons at the ready, and police vehicles surrounding the venue, will anyone survive their concert experience or is there more to The Butcher than meets the eye?

Thoughts:

M Night Shyamalan likes plot holes, pretty sure he does it on purpose.

This movie was no exception, it started super strong but there was so many “How did they know” moments.

This had a great cast, everything about this movie was fun and kept you guessing.

The most unbelievable thing about this movie was the fact that a pop star would have never been able to be alone, that the police and FBI would have never told a bunch of low-level area workers what was going on and if the wife really had an idea why didn't she leave?!

CAUTION; Spoiler Alert

Philadelphia firefighter Cooper Abbott takes his teenage daughter, Riley, to pop star Lady Raven's concert as a reward for her good grades. There, Cooper notices the unusually high police presence around the concert venue. He learns from a vendor named Jamie that the FBI plans to catch a serial killer known as "the Butcher", having learned he will be in attendance. Cooper is revealed to be the Butcher himself, secretly checking footage on his phone of his latest captive victim, Spencer, in a basement. He steals Jamie's ID card and learns the passphrase that will identify him as an employee, using the card to gain access to a back room and steal a police radio.

Hearing a woman predicting his movements over the radio, Cooper sets off an explosion in a food stand's kitchen and uses the chaos to access the roof, where he learns from a police officer that the manhunt is led by Dr. Josephine Grant, an FBI profiler. Confused by Cooper's behavior, Riley asks him to stay with her. She talks about being chosen as Lady Raven's "Dreamer Girl", who gets to dance on stage with the singer and receives backstage access, which Cooper believes has the only exit not covered by the police. Cooper lies to Lady Raven's uncle that Riley recently recovered from leukemia, getting her selected to be the "Dreamer Girl".

However, after the concert ends, Cooper learns that police are also guarding the backstage exit. He privately reveals himself as the Butcher to Lady Raven, threatening to remotely kill Spencer if she does not escort him and Riley out in her limousine. She complies but asks to come to Riley's house, where she stalls for time by explaining the FBI operation to the family, unsettling Cooper by describing Grant's profile of him as someone with maternal issues and obsessive–compulsive disorder. She also explains that the police discovered details about the Butcher's attendance at the concert via a torn ticket receipt left in a vacant house that was reported anonymously.

Lady Raven steals Cooper's phone and locks herself in the bathroom. She obtains details from Spencer about where he was taken and livestreams it to her fans, one of whom finds and rescues him. She outs Cooper to his wife, Rachel, and he locks his family upstairs while Lady Raven texts her driver to contact the police. Cooper attempts to drive off with Lady Raven, but Cooper's family escapes and distracts him long enough for her to flee into her limousine. The police arrive and Cooper flees the house through a secret tunnel before disguising himself using a SWAT uniform and driving the limousine off with Lady Raven. After he reveals his identity, she unlocks the window and draws a mob of fans to stop him so the FBI can catch up, but Cooper changes into a fresh set of civilian clothes and gets away.

Cooper returns home and confronts Rachel. Rachel confesses that she had suspected he was the Butcher and left the receipt in the vacant house for the police to find, thus revealing that she was the one who tipped them off. Cooper decides to kill her and then himself, but Rachel persuades him to share some leftover pie made for Riley. After Cooper admits his hatred for Rachel in causing him to miss seeing his children grow up, he realizes Rachel drugged the pie with pills from his tool bag, leading him to hallucinate his mother expressing pride in him for feeling a real emotion. The hallucination is actually Grant, impersonating Cooper's mother to calm him down, and he is tased by SWAT officers as he walks up to her. As he is led away, he stops to adjust Riley's bicycle and shares a tearful embrace with her before being loaded into a police van. As it drives away, Cooper starts to pick his cuffs with a bicycle spoke he secretly took, laughing to himself. In a mid-credits scene, Jamie learns of Cooper's identity while watching the news.