Boasting an intricately woven plot, two hours of nonstop suspense, and superb acting, “Prisoners” might just be the year’s must-see-thriller.

The movie follows the kidnapping of two young girls in their neighborhood and the subsequent actions of the characters surrounding the incident.

The narrative tackles child kidnapping in a very real way, having it focused on the kidnapped’s parents and the detective. With this being the case, we see fantastic emotional performances from Hugh Jackman as Keller Dover, the father of one of the missing girls, and Jake Gyllenhaal as Detective Loki.

The frustration of both of these characters is captured in a disturbingly truthful way.

With a running time of over 2 hours and 30 minutes, it should come as no surprise that the movie has a few twists and turns. Though it did get fairly complex, I found myself impressed at the cohesion and clarity throughout.

The plot tied so many characters and variables together in a way that was both easy to follow yet complex to detail, if that makes sense. Needless to say, it was masterfully done.

The only shortcoming of the movie that I found is fairly minute, and somewhat of a biased one because it comes from my perspective as a writer. Although I thought the plot was orchestrated beautifully, I would have liked to see more powerful dialogue in the movie.

I felt that it lacked the emotional conviction to be awarded five stars. Now, don’t get me wrong. There was plenty of emotion – it was practically seeping of it. But it was mostly manifested through physical performances.

I would have liked to see a blend of physical and verbal emotion, but then again, I’m sure it could be argued that this representation was more accurate given the circumstances.