‘Trap’: M. Night Shyamalan’s Anxieties in Concert Form

Move over Taylor Swift. There’s a new pop sensation in town: Lady Raven (Saleka Shyamalan). She’s ethereal, has incredible vocal range, and can dance, too. Despite the darkness of her name (a shout to her family’s Philadelphia estate, Ravenwood), she mostly wears white, perhaps to remind you of the purity of her craft.

And among the first to line up to see her in concert is Riley (Ariel Donohue), a roughly 12-year-old girl who can’t stop singing along to Lady Raven’s songs. Meanwhile, her firefighter father, Cooper (Josh Hartnett in his creepiest role yet), can barely keep up physically and lyrically as his daughter races ahead to watch her favorite pop star in concert. Cooper has given it his all to get her coveted floor seats and even puts her on his shoulders so she can catch a glimpse of Lady Raven coming out of her van before the show.

In a world where Taylor Swift can crash websites and sell out stadiums and dresses she wears in mere seconds, Trap is a timely exploration of the force of music, the power and drawbacks of technology, and what exactly makes us human. The tight film also brings you M. Night Shyamalan in a completely new avatar, laying bare all his anxieties as a father.