The underappreciated home invasion horror film The Collector plays considerably better now than it did when it was first released in 2009. Despite hitting the bullseye in the middle of the likeminded “torture porn” era of horror, it failed to make lasting impressions — the subgenre term, a derogatory dismissive. Already “over it” critics called it too cynical and gory to be art. Too little story, they said. No character development. Cynical. Pointless.
Missed from the reception nearly altogether was mention of the film’s attention to detail and exhibition of some of the better crisis acting in existence.
Ex-con Arvin (Josh Stewart) works as a handyman to make ends meet, but moonlights as a thief. Taking inventory of what he spies on his jobs, he plans a robbery to pay off loan sharks eager to attack his family. Nearly into the target safe, he realizes the home he’s picked is already being invaded, and the family who lives there, tortured.
The story brandishes a redemption arc told not in contrived armchair psychology, but in the actions Stewart’s character must commit, to save rather than steal — a fitting rebuff to the lazy trauma stories now all too common. Stewart, whom you may recognize as Bane’s bridge stooge in The Dark Knight Rises, should feel the most affronted by the film’s nearly wholesale dismissal. He’s a sharp-edged actor and probably enjoying Daniel Craig’s career in a parallel universe, leading Bond down considerably darker paths. Stewart didn’t survive the Marvelification of Hollywood, fun as it was, in which an acerbic face like his could hold no place. Christopher Nolan, always earnest, brought Stewart along for bit parts in Interstellar and Tenet. But The Collector showcased him with a leading man’s range — a sign also that the sets and story surrounding him were rich with potential and execution to start.
As in debt as The Collector is to James Wan and Saw, the sets owe more to the clever riggings in Home Alone and the expectation-busting turns of a Shyamalan. Traps punctuate the entries and exits of every room in the accursed house. The special effects work is too crimson to ever be an Oscar contender, yet the world is realistic and jarring enough to make you reconsider your relationship to your skin.
Not to be outdone in sound either, The Collector boasts a score from former Nine Inch Nails drummer Jerome Dillon. Fincher-inspired credits crawl along discordantly to the same caustic industrial buzz that in just another year, would begin to make an increasingly mainstream mark through NIN mastermind Trent Reznor’s first scoring gig, Fincher’s The Social Network. Dillon is perhaps another casualty of coming to maturation in an unappreciative era, capable of just as emotional a turn as Reznor. The Collector features revelatory moments crafted through ascending notes and padded synths.
Other home invasion horror since The Collector has evolved with more traditionally emotional cores (Hush) or military brutality (Don’t Breathe), but not because the organism here was ineffective. Just the opposite — The Collector may be the most effective of the entire subgenre, and once something is perfected, recreating the same becomes what’s cynical and pointless.
Ryan Derenberger is a freelance journalist and editor, a Journalism and AP Language teacher at Whitman HS in Bethesda, MD, and the founder of 'The Idea Sift.' He also serves on the board of directors for student journalism nonprofit 'Kidizenship.'
