Lose the last reel of Trapped and you've got one very creepy, nerve-shattering kidnap thrillers.

The smash 'em-up, crash 'em-up, shoot 'em-up ending comes out of nowhere substituting mayhem for suspense. Trapped is a solid cinema nightmare.

Dr. Will Jennings (Stuart Townsend), his wife Karen (Charlize Theron) and their daughter Abby (Dakota Fanning) are a perfect little family.

The Jennings are more privileged than most but they all love one other.

Unlike the cinema families in such thrillers as One Hour Photo and Unfaithful, there's no cheating spouse and they're not hopelessly inept people.

They refuse to be victims, at least not without a struggle.

Abby is kidnapped by Joe (Kevin Bacon), his wife Cheryl (Courtney Love) and Joe's cousin Marvin (Pruitt Taylor Vince).

This is their fifth such kidnapping and they have it down to a science. Joe is the mastermind so he zeroes in on the wives while Cheryl holds the husband hostage and Marvin hides the child in a cabin.

Money must change hands before the child is returned to the parents. No one ever contacts the police during or after the 24 ordeal and for a chilling reason.

Bacon is fast becoming the Anthony Perkins of his generation. He plays a most convincing and scary psychopath.

Villains in such hostage thrillers have to be evil incarnate so the audience will cheer when they get their just desserts and boy does Bacon get his in Trapped.

Greg Iles, who adapted his own novel, tries to coax some sympathy for the devil Bacon is by giving him a tragedy to motivate his vile behaviour.

Sad as that incident certainly was, it doesn't justify his ugly, menacing, unconscionable acts. He torments his victims and even demands sex from the wives in what has to be the most terrifying situation conceivable.

The early stages of Trapped work remarkably well because there's a great little twist.

The action keeps flipping between the three locations and, in each case, the victims are plotting against their captive and that includes little Abby.

Fanning proves her powerful and convincing performance in I Am Sam was no accident. This is one talented child actor.

Love refuses to play Cheryl as a one-note baddie. She may be just as much a victim as any of the Jennings.

The fact the Jennings take matters into their own hands and turn the tables on their captors is the thriller's strongest ingredient.

It just wasn't necessary for them to turn a stretch of British Columbia highway into a war zone.

(This film is rated AA)

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