One-location thrillers are nearly impossible to pull off, but Buried makes quite a go of it, managing to maintain both interest and tension as we’re pretty much all up in Ryan Reynolds‘ face for almost the entire running time. Reynolds (who’s excellent, by the way — take that, haters) plays a US truck driver based in Iraq who wakes up to find himself buried alive in a wooden coffin with nothing but a phone and his flask to keep him company (well, a few other items, too, but we’re not going to get all spoilery on you); he’s soon receiving calls from his kidnapper, who forces him to make a ransom video and, eventually, perform some decidedly more gruesome acts involving psychological torture and self-mutilation. Buried doesn’t quite stay on target for the entire haul but it’s still an astonishing accomplishment, managing to make what’s essentially a one-man theatre show (with a great supporting voice cast) both grandly cinematic and, in some ways, rather epic in its storytelling. The scene with the snake will really get you squirming; our only real beef is with the rather pointlessly cynical ending.