Trapped in the Canyon

There’s so much going on during the opening credits of “127 Hours” that you might not notice that there’s something missing from them: the title. It’s kind of strange that it doesn’t turn up until the end of the first act, the point in a film where the hero realizes what he’s up against. Since this one involves a mountaineer who’s incapacitated with no help in sight, it makes sense that the title would come at the same time that the urgent dread of the situation dawns on him. Five days and seven hours seems like a long time to make it out of a jam, but it’s a wonder he made it out at all.

Aron Ralston, the real-life inspiration for the film, almost died during a hiking trip gone wrong, but was fortunate enough to have the know-how necessary to survive. James Franco portrays him as an urbanite happy to escape the city for Utah’s Canyonlands National Park, a rocky desert he knows like the back of his hand. He even helps two hikers (Kate Mara and Amber Tamblyn) find their way on a map, and gets along with them so well while showing them the sights that they invite him to a party later. Though he doesn’t rule it out entirely, there’s a sense that Aron feels more content on his own.

His need to go it alone winds up getting him in trouble when he tumbles into a slot canyon, where a rock pins his arm against a wall. When shoving and yanking every which way doesn’t work, he tries to think up an escape plan with the stuff in his bag: There’s a cheap pocketknife that isn’t very sharp, a thermos he probably wished he hadn’t drank so much from, some rope he’d planned on scaling the mountainside with and cameras he thought he’d get happier memories on. After exhausting the best options he can come up with, he’ll have to move on to ones that are less attractive.

If director Danny Boyle’s good at anything, it’s taking a bleak situation and finding the spirit at its center – as stressful as he made “Slumdog Millionaire” seem, it gave audiences plenty to cheer about afterward. You might not like how far “127 Hours” can go, but even if you come away convinced that it’s the best movie you wish you’d never seen, you’ll be glad for the uplift you got because you did.