 | MOVIE DETAILS • Name: Triangle • Year: 2009 • Country: UK/Australia • Director: Christopher Smith • Main cast: Melissa George, Joshua McIvor, Jack Taylor, Liam Hemsworth • Runtime: 99 min • Production company: Icon entertainment International, Framestore • TRAILER |
Triangle is a mystery thriller directed by Christopher Smith (Creep (2004), Black Death (2010)) that appeared in 2009. The story depicts a small boat trip with friends that encounters a big storm and faces it, with bad consequences for all the involved. Melissa George (30 Days of Night (2007)) plays the leading role, the mother of an autistic child that hardly knows the crew and acts kind of weird for going into a holiday escape into the sea. Her strange familiarity with the situations developing and the deja-vu feeling makes the tension increase in a creepy isolated scenario. It’s not easy escaping when you’re surrounded by the sea…
A triangle is a closed figure, with three angles, that forms a plane. A triangle can have many different forms, and depending on it’s angles the shape varies and produces very different results. While as other forms are much restricted, triangles offer a lot of possibilities inside the rule. The title of the movie can also be read as a reference to the Bermuda Triangle, although there’s no direct allusion to it in the film. It also has some relation with the protagonist, but I’d better not go into it to avoid spoilers.
The plot is solid and it develops at a good pace. Although the rhythm is not frantic, it increases until the end, and the tense mood, reinforced by an according saturated photograhy and references in the decor to classics like The Shining (1980), keeps you attached until the end. From my point of view, the story misses some deepness in the plot, which results in a lack of interest for what’s happening, although as said, the mood and the main idea of it can make the watching experience bearable. The surprise factor is also quite crucial, so enjoy it the first time you watch it.
Triangle has been related many times -because of time loops references- to other previous movies like Cronocrímenes akaTimecrimes (2007, from our beloved Nacho Vigalondo) and even further back in time to Primer (2004, from our other beloved Shane Carruth). The director referred in interviews (back when the movie was released) that the idea came to him on 2004, and that those common points are probably the result of the Zeitgeist, “the dominant set of ideals and beliefs that motivate the actions of the members of a society in a particular period in time”. So, no direct references to other contemporary films, although other similarities can be found mostly with Cronocrímenes. I would recommend, if you’re interested in this kind of time mysteries, to watch both of them. Even if they’re not my favourite movies, the ideas behind and the questions they may arise can be food for though for some days.
RATE: 6,5/10
IMDB URL: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1187064/
