Just Like 12 Angry Men: 5 Gripping Movies That Take Place in a Confined Space
Claustrophobia plays an important role in these projects.
Time and space are two quantities that have no laws in cinema: in the course of an hour and a half, we live through a dozen other people's lives, and a mysterious forest is hidden in the closet under the stairs.
We have chosen five films in which directors work with physically limited locations in very different ways: from literally confined spaces to the metaphorical imprisonment of consciousness.
1. Sleuth, 1972
Sleuth is a truly brilliant post-detective story that changes the rules of the genre on the fly, but manages to pull off this big trick in a tight theatrical setting.
Successful crime writer Andrew Wyke invites his wife's lover Milo Tindle to his luxurious home. He claims that he will turn a blind eye to the affair and let his mistress go if the guest stages a robbery.
Everything is like in the best detective stories of Agatha Christie, only more cunning: if you manage to predict the end, you can consider yourself a true connoisseur of the genre.
2. Gerald's Game, 2017
During a role-playing game, the husband falls dead on top of his wife, who is chained to the bed. Now the wife must escape her captivity.
Stephen King is an expert on all things madness within four walls. In Misery, the author's character tried to escape an obsessed fan by becoming a prisoner in an ominous cabin. In Gerald's Game, the protagonist has to fight first with herself and then with external enemies.
At first, the movie resembles a realistic survival thriller in the spirit of 127 Hours, but towards the end, internal demons make themselves known: fears and childhood traumas emerge from the subconscious, filling the screen with creepy entities.
3. Tape, 2001
The young director Jon, who has come to the independent film festival, lectures his alcoholic friend Vince. Soon the confrontation between the two friends reaches its limit and a humorous argument turns into a real fight.
As luck would have it, Amy, a woman who knows the secrets of both friends, comes to their room. In these four walls, there is enough space for both a Hitchcock thriller and a melodrama.
4. Rope, 1948
Brandon Shaw and Phillip Morgan kill a fellow student for fun and hide his body in a trunk. After some time, a party begins in the house – close friends and relatives of the victim arrive, and the tension in the air begins to drive the killers crazy.
Hitchcock's Rope is not only a movie whose events unfold in one room, but also a masterful drama filmed in long takes.
5. Panic Room, 2002
In one of David Fincher's most underrated films, a truly claustrophobic image unfolds: on the very first night after moving in, a mother and daughter find themselves locked in a special room while burglars roam the luxurious home.
The film not only masterfully demonstrates the fear of being confined to a small space, but also questions whether it is possible to feel safe in one's own home, or even one's own country.