Oxygen

Aja's latest isn't really a return to his roots, but it's definitely a film that limits his legroom. Rather than go full-out, Oxygen is set in a single, cramped location, with one principal actor and just a handful of flashbacks to escape the film's claustrophobic setting. One of those films where it's entirely up to the director to keep things interesting.

A woman wakes up in a small pod. A computer voice alerts her that something is wrong and that she is running out of oxygen at an alarming rate. The woman has no recollection of her past and she can only communicate with the AI. Little by little she starts piecing things together, but her time is running out very quickly.

I hoped Aja would've used this setup as an excuse for some audiovisual muscle flexing, and though he does his best I felt there was the potential to go a lot further still. Laurent does a good job and the plot was interesting enough, though not exactly very original. Oxygen is good, solid genre cinema with a little extra, but not quite masterpiece material.