P2

US/Canada, 2008, 98 minutes, Colour.
Wes Bentley, Rachel Nichols
Directed by Frank Khalfoun

P2 is an area in a parking lot. It is Christmas eve and Angela (Rachel Nichols) is conscientiously working late though expected at her sister’s with a Santa Claus costume and gifts for the children. By the time she is ready to leave, she comes down in the elevator with Carl the supervisor (and we guess, rightly, that the next time we see him he will be dead). Then her car won’t start – we knew it wouldn’t. She looks for help and finds Tom, a security guard (Wes Bentley) who kindly offers her jump leads. But, we guess he has tampered with the car and when she calls for a taxi and he invites her to share a Christmas eve meal with him, we know that it is going to be a long night, that she is going to be harassed and assaulted, flooded in an elevator, hidden in the boot of a car, chained… and that he is a mad ‘collector’. When the taxi does come, the automatic doors of the building don’t work, the taxi goes off and…

This is female in peril stuff with some rather bloody sequences, some overpowering cruelty on Tom’s part, some desperation on Angela’s but, despite everything, she uses her wits and her strength to confront Tom.

The film is really an exercise in terror film-making with effective sets and pace (and some audience jumps, especially with a vicious dog) and reasonable performances. It will be too scary for some, too bloody for others and, over all, there is a brutal atmosphere and some sadistic sequences. The film comes, as the poster boasts, from the makers of Switchblade Romance – so, this is either an enticement or a warning off.

1. The makers of the film and their career? Interest in horror films? Terror?

2. The film as a terror exercise? By the numbers, use of the female in peril? The menacing madman?

3. The confined atmosphere of the parking area?

4. The location, the parking area? Christmas Eve, the dark, light? The cars? The emptiness? The use of the location for fear, menace, terror? For the introduction to Angela, her work, the man coming to the office, the background of his assaulting her? His apology, her forgiveness? Her phone call to her sister, the family waiting for her at home, her continued work? Her leaving the office late, the encounter with the security guard? Going down in the elevator?

5. Going to the car, the gifts, the car not starting? The security and the locked doors? Her finding Tom, his offer to jump start the car and the battery? The failed attempt?

6. Angela and her decision to get a taxi? Her calling the taxi, waiting, her not being able to get out? The absence of Carl, the guard? Her seeing the taxi go? Tom and his assault, rendering her unconscious? (And the later scene of the video and his treatment of her while unconscious?).

7. Angela, her strength of character, her reactions, using her wits? Participating in the dinner? Her being chained? The fear of the dog? Her getting away? The pursuit, Tom and his following her, brutalising her? The attempt to get the mobile phone? The message getting through, the not retrieving the machine? Her hiding, her being in the elevator, his flooding the elevator? Her discovering Carl’s body? Getting out? Her continued use of her wits, hiding in cars? Going to the office? The chase, the death of the dog? Tom’s reaction to this? Her hiding? The police arriving, the search, her inability to alert them? The boot of the car? The getting out?

8. Tom, his seeming kindness, his personality? The dinner, assaulting her? His mad talk, continued persecution, the dog? The violence? The death of the man, running him down? Bashing him? Angela’s wanting to save him?

9. The police, the search, Tom and his behaviour with them? The mirrors, the cameras – and Angela breaking them?

10. The final confrontation, her stabbing Tom, her getting keys? Her chaining him to the car, the petrol, setting it alight?

11. Her final exit into the Christmas morning? Her suffering? Her action, being saved?

12. The female in peril? The mad menacer, the collector? The woman defeating the man? The picture of violence? Too much? Sadism in the presentation of the violence? An exercise in the cinema of terror?