Deathtrap
**This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the movies being covered here wouldn’t exist.
It took me a while to finally watch Sidney Lumet’s “Deathtrap.” I bought it for my mother several years ago, and I remembered clips of it, but never saw the entire thing until around 2018-2019. It was another film I finally pulled the trigger on because of ’80s All Over. One of the delightful pleasures of this film is how stripped-down and constantly moving it is, even as it takes place in a single location. That is because Lumet keeps us focused on watching the narrative unfold, and gets sensational work out of Michael Caine and Christopher Reeve. Even when Andrzej Bartkowiak’s cinematography is cut off by the pan-and-scan nature of the DVD I watched it on, the same one I got my mother, the tension of the film keeps us on our toes.
The film begins at the opening of the latest play by Sidney Bruhl (Caine), a mystery writer whose best days seem to be behind him. The critics call his new one DOA, and he goes home, dejected, to his wife, Myra (Dyan Cannon). He’s got ideas, but what is the point if they won’t put him on top? As he and his wife talk, he looks at a draft of a play he’s been sent by a former student, Clifford Anderson, and he has an idea. The play is very good- what if he takes it for his own? When Clifford (Reeve) comes to meet him and discuss it, though, we watch a murder mystery unfold before our very eyes.
“Deathtrap” is adapted from Ira Levin’s two-act play by Jay Presson Allen, and the script is- from my understanding- a fairly straightforward adaptation of the text, save for one moment that was added for the film, and made explicit something that was gradually built up on stage. Once the reveal happens on film, it transforms the story entirely, and risks turning it into something salacious and unwatchable, especially by modern standards of representation. What we get, however, is a devious and darkly funny dance between Caine- already a major acting titan- and Reeve- who was still figuring himself out away from “Superman”- that engages us with both characters, and both points-of-views. Apparently, Reeve got a lot of shit for his performance in this film, and it’s a shame, because he should have been an Oscar nominee for his work. On a dime, he matches Caine beat-for-beat, and doesn’t let the outrageousness of the reveal remove the humanity of the character, even if he seems to be verging on something darker. The power dynamics at work remain the same throughout, but shift when necessary for the purposes of the plot. You can tell that Caine is enjoying playing off of Reeve, as well, and they have a chemistry that makes the whole film work.
What Lumet and Bartkowiak do in shooting this film makes it feel like a bigger production than it does. The house is built as a larger landscape, with each room- and each landmark- serving a particular purpose. The study with the props from past productions. The fireplace. The living room. The bedroom. Even outside, when Bruhl walks to discuss his wife’s affairs with his attorney (Henry Jones), feels like an important place for this discussion- and its reveals- to occur. This is such a smart and rich use of sparse locations and settings; like he did with “12 Angry Men,” keeping things in a single space matters, and ramps up the tension. “Deathtrap” has plenty of suspense to offer, as well as a lot of entertainment.
