An Ode to The Bottle Thriller

BY KADEN MILLER

YOU’RE GOING to be locked in a tight space. It’s one that stirs a general feeling of discomfort in the pit of your stomach. You’re going to be the only one there, and you’ll be severely weakened, giving you less than a fighting chance at escape. And, of course, you’re going to be up against a hellish antagonist. If you found yourself in such a scenario, you’d be smack-dab in the middle of a bottle thriller — a seemingly overlooked subgenre under the thriller umbrella that thrives on what it doesn’t have. Bottle thrillers lack an ensemble cast filled with studio stars or a set replete with sprawling vistas — the type that typically accompany similarly thrilling films of the North by Northwest variety — instead cutting every ounce of fat until only the bare bones are left. That’s actually the magic of the bottle thriller: being just as, if not more entrancing and entertaining by doing more than most films do with less than most films have.

For clarity, I’m going to use four films to demonstrate the beauty of the bottle thriller: Rear Window , a 1954 film directed by Alfred Hitchcock; Wait Until Dark , a 1967 film directed by Terence Young; 12 Angry Men , a

1957 film directed by Sidney Lumet; and Panic Room , a 2002 film directed by David Fincher. I think you’ll notice, however, that these elements can be applied to a much wider net of films than you might initially expect. The primary feature of a bottle thriller is the bottle — that is, the tightly enclosed space that governs the plot and its characters for the entirety of the film. There isn’t a lot of conclusive evidence as to the origin of the subgenre (or the term, for that matter), but the most likely link is with the all-important setting and its ancestry to the stage, which was itself a limitation of scene diversity. While some bottle thrillers chose to expand their horizons slightly for the screen, most stay true to the theatrical roots of having one firm, digestible location that’s fleshed out throughout the duration of the movie. At first, it may come as a drag for a film to tread on one locale for its entire runtime, but this is actually one of the bottle thriller’s greatest virtues: such an extended length of time allows us to familiarize ourselves with the surroundings, giving us a firm grasp on the environment that heightens the suspense we feel. Con - sider the apartments in Rear Window , for example, as we become accustomed to the habits of the tenants and wary of the man Jeffries suspects, or in the titular Panic Room as we learn the motivations of the home invaders and their individual ticks. Beyond that, the best bottle thrillers give the location itself a personality that bleeds into the tension. Wait Until Dark’s apartment is designed specifically for the protagonist, a blind woman, and it’s a true joy to discover the different facets the setting has to offer and the different ways in which they’ll be used to build suspense. To me, this method of environmental storytelling is significantly more engaging than emotionless landscapes of many sprawl - ing thrillers and adds a je ne sais quoi that isn’t otherwise achieved — by the time we are intimately acquainted with our star, we care about their success. While the bottle thriller’s condensed cast means that this claustrophobia is felt by fewer characters, this narrowed lens provides other benefits. By maintaining a small group of characters present throughout the entire film, the audience is given a better opportunity to learn the ins and outs of who we’re dealing with, making the probable twists more rewarding. 12

Angry Men shows us a full picture of each juror’s individual personalities and associated biases, which makes the plot’s unraveling all the more enjoy - able to see. Knowing more about who you’re watching greatly increases the depth of enjoyment — providing the audience with a reason to care, beyond being told that they should, maximizes the dramatic value in the plot. Moreover, your emotional attachment to the protagonist will likely increase as well due to the extensive screen time a bottle thriller allows them to have. 12 Angry Men’s Juror #8 (Henry Fonda) has become one of the quintessential protagonists of the 20th century due to our increased exposure to him, and Wait Until Dark’s Susy (Audrey Hepburn) cultivates an instant connection that is amplified by later events.

To maximize tension, said protagonists are usually given strategic disabilities — i.e. Jeffries’ leg injury in Rear Window or Susy’s blindness in Wait Until Dark — to keep them in the palm of the antagonist. These disabilities are often the crux of the story ( Rear Window wouldn’t function if Jeffries could just walk over and to the neighbor’s place) and this is usually done to add a base level of interest in the film and squeeze out as much tension from the script as can be created. Once again, it’s just plainly a lot of fun to see a protagonist overcome both their hindrance and their antagonist to succeed and the best bottle thrillers provide us this aplenty. This is what the bottle thriller is all about — captivating us by making extensive use of what it doesn’t have to amplify what it does.

You’ve probably heard of a “turnyour-brain-off-film” — that is, a movie that doesn’t attempt to bring much in the area of thematic importance or plot complications, but instead allows you to see something fun without working too hard? There seems to be a rift between those who are fans of the easy-viewing traits found in many action and superhero genre film s and those who are on their nth rewatch of Primer, but bottle thrillers give you something out of each camp to love. A side effect of a limited setting and a limited cast is not a limited plot, but a less intertwined and perhaps less complicated one. Many are quite simple, and can be summarized as so — Rear Window’s “injured man thinks he witnessed a murder through his window,” or Wait Until Dark’s “blind woman is conned by thieves” — though this actually adds to the depth of the experience, rather than taking away from it.

Having fewer bells and whistles to draw your attention keeps us focused on the story’s tension and heightens the experience to a much greater degree than that found in an overly complex feature, and will satisfy both the viewer looking for something complex and the viewer that’s there for a good time. If you’ve ever heard the phrase “less is more” (surely you have), bottle thrillers are the filmic equivalent. This is, of course, not to diminish the enjoyment associated with thrillers of tremendous size, but for my money the classic bottle thriller is a perfect storm of simplistic yet immensely entertaining elements. Their streamlined plots give ample room for character development and the confined settings lock us in an incredibly thrilling cinematic trance. I implore you to give another look into one of the most purely delightful subgenres I’ve ever seen. So, the next time you’re locked in for the night, maybe you’ll consider putting on a bottle thriller?