Room

Room (15)

Ireland/Canada 2015 118 mins  Dir: Lenny Abrahamson  Starring: Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, Sean Bridgers, Joan Allen, William H. Macy

Connoisseurs of crappy Hollywood captive/survival thrillers will be familiar with the moment when the heroine – it’s generally a woman – does something entirely daft and counter-intuitive, like lightly whacking the psycho about the head and then turning her back on him, as if he’s not about to leap up and menace her once again. Nothing quite so cheesy happens in Emma Donoghue’s adaptation of her own Booker Prize shortlisted novel, which was in turn in inspired in part by the Josef Fritzl case, but there are moments of credulity-straining, if undeniably suspenseful plotting here. What Irish director Lenny Abrahamson’s follow-up to Frank and the under-appreciated What Richard Did really has going for it is a brace of outstanding performances by Brie Larson and young newcomer Jacob Tremblay.

Joy (Larson) was snatched from the street at the age of 17 and has been held captive in a shabby single-room garden shed for seven years by a man she calls Old Nick (Bridgers), who pops in every so often to deliver basic supplies and rape her. She acquiesces to his demands but is fiercely protective of her five-year-old, long-haired mini-me son Jack (Tremblay), who has known no world other than this cramped space with a bed, bath, TV, rudimentary kitchen and single skylight. As a result, this bright, inquisitive, naïve kid struggles with such concepts as ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ and has developed bizarre notions about reality. With a crisis looming, Joy hatches a plan of escape that hinges upon exploiting her wily captor’s hitherto unrevealed gullibility rather than walloping him about the genitals while he takes a post-coital nap until he divulges the keypad entry code, which might seem a more effective strategy. Read no further – and on no account watch the trailer – if you don’t want to know what happens next.

In stark and refreshing contrast to mainstream Hollywood films of this nature, Room evinces no interest whatsoever in the character, background, motivation and fate of Old Nick. Instead, the focus is entirely upon his captives, although the film deviates from the novel in admitting perspectives other than Jack’s. Brie Larson, who’s best known for her comedy roles in the likes of Trainwreck and 21 Jump Street, takes the powerfully raw, cosmetics-free, sallow-skinned route to awards glory as the mother whose ferocious maternal devotion overrides any hint of Stockholm Syndrome. But even though he’s a little older than the character he plays, it’s young Jacob Tremblay who impresses the most, delivering a totally convincing performance free of the usual grating child actor precociousness.

Everybody on screen and off breathes out when the claustrophobia of the film’s first half gives way exhilaratingly to the freedom of the outside world, but Room doesn’t loosen its grip as this presents a new set of challenges to mother and son as they struggle to adjust to life beyond their confined space. To complicate matters further, there’s intense media interest in their experiences and Joy’s now separated parents (reunited Pleasantville couple Joan Allen and William H. Macy) have very different responses to their new grandson. To their credit, Abrahamson and Donoghue sidestep the anticipated glib, fake feelgood ending, opting for a more nuanced and ambiguous one of far greater emotional power, in which innocent Jack gains strength from experiencing the rush of wonder of the world for the first time, while the more brittle, damaged Joy retreats from its harshness.