Written and directed by Anthony Edward Curry, who also stars as the lead of the film, facing life in prison, a hood dreams of the violent streets that forged his identity, but cursed his soul. Starring: Adam Ahlbrandt, Dylan Andresen, J.D. Brown, Malik Dukes, Wesley Green, Brandon Howland, Marissa Jade and Tina Krause.

You can quickly tell that Anthony Edward Curry is going for a noughties style crime flicks, throwing back to the days of 8 Mile, Get Rich or Die Tryin’ and Alpha Dog, with maybe a touch of White Boy Rick. Young men led astray by a life of crime that offers quick success, respect and cash, but isn’t almost the smoothest road. That foundation is there but the way in which it’s presented makes it difficult to get into this story. Using that back and forth timeline doesn’t always do it a lot of favours when it’s jumping around so quickly from scene to scene, making itself harder to follow.

One of the issues is that it introduces a number of characters in the beginning but it really only needed to introduce one. That initial distraction becomes an ongoing theme and Trap seems to struggle to settle in and really get to grips with this story, instead choosing a style that asks the audience to piece things together. It isn’t entirely framing the protagonist as the lead of the story until further into the film which means it misses that chance to let viewers get to know him. All the violence and crime still have their place, they just needed also give space to explore his personality and motivations. Especially as it feels as though Curry had more to offer with his performance, that he doesn’t get the chance to show.

There’s a giant variety of different shooting styles throughout and some are more successful than others. Some go for a very gritty, unpolished look while there’s also some sporadic moments that have really great cinematography and create something sharp. It’s a shame to not see it expand those moments, occasionally slow itself down, add a bigger tension and conflict into the mix. Although there is something to the unpredictability of its style that’s reminiscent of a memory impacted by drugs and violence, so it does thematically work but it’s not as effective as it could be.

Trap feels as though it wanted to portray a real, everyday perspective on crime but it couldn’t quite find its footing. The pieces of the story are there but don’t feel presented in the most effective way, there’s a distracted quality to the way that it’s told. It moves around from scene to scene in a frenzy and doesn’t really take a breath to dig into things and give its leading character space to grow a few more layers.

Verdict: ✯✯ | 4/10

Next screening at Chattanooga Film Festival June 29 & Long Island International Film Expo July 20