'Buried'

'Buried' (PG-13) (3 1/2 stars)

Writer: Chris Sparling
Director: Rodrigo Cortes
Starring: Ryan Reynolds With the Voices of: Stephen Tobolowsky, Samantha Mathis, Erik Palladino

I remember laughing when the late movie critic Joel Siegel always gave an over hyped tag line on a movie he loved. After watching "Buried" I feel like giving a Siegel like tag line. Well "Buried" is a white knuckle thriller that you won't be able to shake for days! "Buried" is a simple thriller that is spellbinding, intense and very uncomfortable. It is also brilliantly filmed and acted and it all takes place in a coffin. When the movie starts it stays on a black screen as we start to hear some one breathing. Actually it is a man gasping for air as we find out that he has been buried alive in the ground. The man is Paul Conroy and he is a contract worker in Iraq and he is a truck driver. He is ambushed one day in the desert and is now where we find him, in a coffin. There are many gruesome ways to die (just watch the "Saw" movies) but I think everyone can agree that being buried alive is probably the worst way to die. Paul has two things he is able to use and that is a cell phone and a lighter and the way he uses them is genius. Paul gets a call on the cell phone and it is from the man who put him there and he wants a ransom. From the get go I felt squeamish and uncomfortable and my palms were starting to sweat. I am claustrophobic to begin with and I was finding it hard to sit through. Then when I could return to my normal breathing I got carried away with this movie. This movie is a lot of fun and it is very suspenseful and intense. It also has a great sense of humor and I laughed more in this movie then I have in a lot of comedies lately. It also has the best performance of Ryan Reynold's career so far for he is outstanding in a difficult role. He won't get Oscar notice but he now has a Snavely award nomination for his bravura performance. He handles the coffin setting brilliantly and he is perfectly cast to handle the movie's twisted humor. Director Ricardo Cortes is someone to keep an eye on for his direction is flawless. You will remember this movie for days and it has more suspense than a handful of recent horror movies. Yes this is a movie that Hitchcock would be proud of. "Buried" will leave you gasping for air because it flawlessly uses it's setting to make you feel you are really in that coffin. Except for one scene that throws one too many obstacles for Paul, "Buried" is a near perfect masterpiece.