Everett, Wash.
Published: Friday, November 9, 2007

Parking garage thriller rings hollow

By Robert Horton
Herald Movie Critic

 The creepiness of parking garages is pretty much accepted as a universal, so the makers of "P2" have definitely got a concept here. This film takes place mostly in the dank concrete jungle beneath a clean, well-lighted corporate building in Manhattan.

It's Christmas Eve, and if our heroine, a businesswoman played by Rachel Nichols, had watched the holiday-set "Die Hard," she might have had some idea what she's in for.

Instead, just when the building has cleared out, she's confronted by the freaky parking attendant (Wes Bentley), who's down on level P2. Bentley has something in mind for Nichols, and it includes an intimate Christmas dinner: turkey, wine, and the handcuffs that keep her chained to the table.

The subsequent unpleasantness uses the various levels of the parking garage for maximum effect, and the movie certainly never lets up. The story was hatched by Alexandre Aja and Gregory Levasseur, who came up with the clever and maddening French thriller "Haute Tension."

There's some amount of logic in the trapped heroine's actions. And, from the box office perspective, there's logic in putting Nichols in a low-cut evening dress.

I liked the fact that no guns are used -- just weirdness and a Taser. In fact, the words "Don't Tase me, bro," will be echoing through theaters throughout the nation this weekend, just because of certain moments in this movie.

If director Franck Khalfoun stages the action in an acceptable way (including a couple of required gross-out moments), he fails miserably to supply his two actors with something to play. Other than Suffering Victim and Crazed Psycho, that is. It's all borrowed from other movies about stalkers.

Rachel Nichols is a model known for an ongoing role on "Alias," and she probably has some kind of career ahead of her. Whether she can act or not isn't answered by this movie, but she is adept at torment.

Wes Bentley looked like a star-in-the-making when "American Beauty" launched him, but he hasn't made a big impression since then. This proves he can get his Anthony Perkins on, but not much else.

Of course, Perkins' performance in "Psycho" made people stop taking showers, and "P2" will likely have a similar effect on parking garages. It's an excellent argument for carpooling.
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