Trapped - Are You ?

#Trapped: There are high-rises around. There are millions of people around. Yet no one can hear your voice or may be no one wants to. Have you ever experienced that loneliness, the feeling of being left out, the helplessness of not being able to reach out? Have you ever spoken to the mirror in front or with the lizard on the wall at some moment of wretched loneliness?  Have you seen life slip by, as you set out on our journey to fulfil those big aspirations, get trapped in a vicious cycle and realized at the end of the day how you have missed celebrating the small things in life. Have the realization of being blessed with the basics to live a comfortable life ever dawned on you?

While Vikramaditya Motwane’s ingenious film Trapped belongs to the survivor genre, his only protagonist Shourya’s struggle is allegorical. It is as much a struggle within as it is to break out of the claustrophobic set up. Motwane and his writers Amit Joshi and Hardik Mehta intelligently use symbolism to drive home their point. The apartment Shourya gets trapped in is metaphorically named “Swarg”. The city where his voice struggles to reach out to a single person is actually the maximum city Mumbai where millions live. And the main protagonist himself, who gets scared of rat, is named as Shourya . But when put against the wall, Shourya’s survival instincts come to the fore and he fights all odds.

Trapped is neither an easy film to make, nor an easy film to digest. Motwane shows enough courage to take up the project and Rajkumar Rao puts his heart and soul into the character. In just about seven years from playing Adarsh in  Love Sex & Dhokha to Shahid Azmi in Shahid to Deepu Sebastian in Aligarh to, Deepak in City lights to  Shourya in Trapped , this man has metamorphosed into one of the most flexible young actors we have today. Watch out for scene where he comes back to the flat after being trapped in it.  The eyes say it all, the feeling of conquering his inner fears . Sidhhartha Dwivedi’s cinematography is top notch. He masterfully uses natural light and shoots from close angles to create the tension.

However unlike other survivor films like Cast Away, Trapped fails to give enough edge of the seat moments. While you understand Shourya’s plight after a point you don’t feel his pain. Shourya’s attempts become repetitive. And that is where Trapped loses some steam. However personally for me it was not just a film about survival, it was a film with a much deeper metaphysical subtext.

Trapped is a gutsy attempt at making good cinema and deserves a watch. Go, acquire the courage to fight and get out of the vicious cycle or remain lonely and trapped. The fight is as much within as it is with outside world. Your choices can liberate you or leave you scared for life!