Buried

Buried is surprising in that it’s not an indie festival flick, but a mainstream movie. Some viewers may consider that to be a drawback, but for me, the film’s ability to captivate and move the masses with a single actor in such a small place is its greatest asset. It thus comes closest to Joel Schumacher’s Phone Booth, in which the desperate protagonist squirms in an equally confined space, though standing upright and with a better view:-). Buried is superbly written, filmed and acted, with an ending that delivers an uncompromising knock-out blow. (2011-12-06)

FUUUUUUCK! A tricky situation, don’t you think? An ingenious idea to shut a guy in a coffin and then to take all his hopes away one by one. That in itself has the potential for at very least some breathtaking, erm... entertainment (?) that can be completely emotionally draining for the viewer. Buried remains somewhere in mid journey, and its main enemy is time. If the movie were an hour long and it could have been absolutely perfect, this way it’s one and a half hours and is “merely" above average. The side-stories are so unlikely that they are damaging and take the attention away from the most important aspect, intruding into the stifling atmosphere which the absolutely amazing direction managed to create. The camerawork and the lighting are first rate. And we also have Ryan Reynolds who gives the performance of a lifetime. An extraordinary picture. What’s your social security number? (2010-12-23)

The male breed must be in deep trouble if even someone like Ryan Reynolds who can boast the title of Most Attractive Man in the World 2010 isn’t able to deal with a situation that members of the gentler sex can get out of blindfold (Uma) and (Noomi). And although overall he does this in an entertaining and appealing way, I can’t help feeling that this movie could have been a little shorter. (2011-01-10)

Let's put an uninteresting man in a coffin and watch how uninteresting he is. The main character's hideous defeatism at a point when he could at least try to break out those already cracked coffin boards, but he'd rather take revenge on whoever threw him in there by making his phone bill more expensive by making one international call after another. It also wasn’t until the second half of the film that someone finally explained to the director that fire takes oxygen, among other things, so we can't be surprised that for the first 30 minutes the protagonist lights his Zippo just to lie down. On the other hand, the ending left me feeling with a really bad taste in my mouth, and a film that takes place entirely in a coffin can be made little better. (2012-07-30)

The equipment from which MacGyver would make a mining drill, an air supply that exceeds the physical limit of volume and a phone signal that would make a regular operator pay in gold are compensated by an unpredictable plot and an excellent Ryan Reynolds. What is most surprising is that the director squeezes the original concept throughout the entire runtime, without any significant slump or climax. Rodrigo Cortés is a concept for the future, and not just for those opening "Hitchcock credits." 4 ½. (2010-12-29)