The Loft

Besides comedy, thrillers are probably my next favorite genre. The fact they you get to see a person or several people get into stressful and dangerous situations all in the safeness of your theater seat is intriguing to me. Thrillers have being around about as long as the invention of films themselves, and when they start, a cavalcade a problems ensue. "The Loft" is certainly one of those thrillers that keep one on the edge of that proverbial seat which makes nail-biting into a sport itself.

This tense psychological thriller is a story of five guys, Vincent Stevens(Karl Urban), Chris Vanowen (James Marsden), Luke Seacord (Wentworth Miller), Marty Landry (Eric Stonestreet) and Philip Trauner (Matthias Schoenaerts) who conspire to secretly share a penthouse loft in the city--a place where they can indulge in their deepest fantasies. But the fantasy becomes a nightmare when they discover the dead body of an unknown woman in the loft, and they realize one of the group must be involved, especially since they all had their own key and there were no others. Paranoia seizes them as everyone begins to suspect one another. Friendships are tested, loyalties are questioned and marriages crumble as the group is consumed by fear, suspicion and murder in this relentless thriller.
This film works as a series of flashbacks as the group are questioned by Detective Huggins (Kristin Lehman) and Detective Cohagen (Robert Wisdom) as they attempt to explain what transpired to bring them to the predicament they are now in.

Others to round out the cast are Isabel Lucas as Sarah Deakins, Rachael Taylor as Anne Morris, Rhona Mitra as Allison Vanowen, Chris' wife, Valerie Cruz as Barbara Stevens, Vincent's wife, Kali Rocha as Mimi Landry, as Marty's wife, Elaine Cassidy as Ellie Seacord, Luke's wife, Margarita Levieva as Vicky Fry, Ric Reitz as Joel Kotkin, Graham Beckel as Hiram Fry, Vicky's father, and Kathy Deitch as Dana.

This was paced with incredible grit and intensity by director Erik Van Looy ("Ad Fundum" '93, "Shades" '99, "The Memory of a Killer" '03, "Loft" '08). It's certainly refreshing to watch a film directed by a pro in the genre that's being presented, and in the case of this film, Looy has nailed this thriller. The tenseness and fear of being found about exuded by these five guys was honest and real and simply added to the suspense of this film. It was slickly written by Wesley Strick based on the 2008 film, "Loft" written by Bart De Pauw. Strick is definitely an experienced writer and since he already had a meaty screenplay in which to base this film, how could he go wrong? There were a couple of small places going back and forth with the flashbacks that caused minimal choppiness, but all in all this was a tight, crisp and intense script that kept the audience moving right along. The up side to the premise of this film is that this film will probably do for the male gender today that "Fatal Attraction" '87 did for that gender back in the day. In other words, men (or women) might just think twice about infidelity after seeing this film as they did back in '87.

Whether you like the genre of thrillers or not, this is certainly an intriguing film to make the male gender, or women for that matter, to think about what they are doing in life, and use a small amount of prudence to realize that if one makes the wrong decision, consequences will be a hell on earth.

Out of 4 Stars: 3.5                           Rated: R                             104mins.