127 Hours (Danny Boyle, 2010)

Danny Boyle may be on the right side of the hit-or-miss equation with a large part of the credit due to Trainspotting and 28 Days Later, Slumdog Millionaire and Sunshine bolstering a record too strong to be brought down by the occasional A Life Less Ordinary. At least you know what he presents will take risks, and that's usually worth the price of admission. Taking on the Aron Ralston story is a bigger gamble than before, though. A man will spend 5 days trapped under a desert rock, alone, and then saw his arm off to survive. Every development is already in place, and it's just an inexorable, agonising grind towards that cathartic moment.
Boyle ducks out of putting the viewer through the same torment as that of the protagonist by inserting dream sequences, flashbacks and dramatic interludes that provide some respite in the form of other situations and characters, and some of the phases move a little too far in the direction of the mystical or showy, but then we are dealing with the inside of one man's head and with the knowledge that Ralston gave the end result his seal of approval. It can't be the director's most satisfying work, being compromised by having to make an unpalatable event with little wider message into entertainment of a fashion, but to its credit it does steer the right side of exploitation.

6/10