MOVIE NEWS – Josh Hartnett dived deep into the psychology of serial killers to be as authentic as possible in Trap…

Josh Hartnett, star of M. Night Shyamalan’s latest thriller, Trap, studied serial killers for the film, and the actor learned some exciting things. The most important: “They want recognition.” Trap, released this weekend, marks the actor’s return to the Hollywood spotlight after a very long absence. For obvious reasons, he also took his preparation seriously.

In the film, Hartnett plays the father of a teenage girl who travels with his daughter to a pop concert. As they prepare to experience the most beautiful moment of their lives, the father begins to see signs that law enforcement agents are quietly surrounding the scene. A serial killer is being hunted, and all signs point to him. With the theme in mind, Hartnett delved into the world of profiling serial killers to learn a thing or two about them.

In a conversation with Comic Book, Hartnett shares his findings:

“There are lots of interesting aspects of people with psychopathy and the amount of kind of serial killers that are willing to talk to reporters about what they did and why they did it, it’s amazing because they want recognition. They want to be out there. But also, the thing that most people who are writing about them will say is that they’re incredibly charming in person and you almost think you doubt many times over the course of talking to them that they could be the ones that do these horrible things because they’ve necessarily spent their whole lives trying to convince people that they’re not these monsters, right?”

Hartnett goes on to explain that this particular survival skill remains even after serial killers have been caught.

“And they still don’t get away. They still never get away from that even when they’re in prison and they want to put you at your ease and they want to, like, you’re more [easily manipulated] when you’re at your ease. That part was incredibly useful for this movie because we need him to be charming and we need the audience to go along with him. So, it needs to be convincing and that was kind of the crux of it.”

Trap suggests a solid return for both Josh Hartnett and Shyamalan

Given that Shyamalan’s films often contain twists and turns, we won’t go into details beyond the above. All we can say is that the director seems to be returning to the territory where he feels most comfortable: a deep, dark thriller without supernatural features. Many analyzed the previews, but the director himself revealed that the trailers do not spoil the final twist, so there is no need to speculate further.

Trap is also a golden opportunity for Hartnett, who suddenly stopped making large-scale films and waved goodbye to Hollywood. Hartnett recently opened up about some of the reasons for the hiatus, including his experiences with toxic fandom. The first reviews confirm that she is the perfect protagonist for the film, given her ability to charm with her golden smile, which could easily hide something sinister…

Source: ComicBook.com