Big Read: Jake Gyllenhaal, Hugh Jackman give 'career-best' performances in Prisoners In the kidnapping thriller-with-a-twist, Jackman and Maria Bello play a couple whose child eerily disappears along with the daughter of the friends they are visiting. JAKE Gyllenhaal was sceptical when French Canadian director Denis Villeneuve first approached him with the screenplay for Prisoners. The suspense thriller's script may have been a gripping page turner, but it also contained more than a few familiar elements for fans of the genre. A desperate search for two abducted little girls. A police detective (Gyllenhaal) forced by red tape to let the creepy suspect back out on the streets. And a father (Hugh Jackman) who takes matters into his own hands as the clock ticks away ... In the wrong hands the movie could have descended into pulpy cliche. But rave reviews - Variety believes Jackman and Gyllenhaal give "career-best performances" - and Prisoners' debut atop the US box office suggest Villeneuve's film has transcended the formula. "When I asked him about the supposed pitfalls of the genre and the supposed cliches he was so quick to want to talk about ways in which we could deflect (that) and ways in which we could elaborate, and ways in which it wasn't going to be like that," the 32-year-old explains. Hugh Jackman says working with Jake Gyllenhaal "was like playing great tennis." I knew that inherently about him anyway. You know, cliches are cliches for a reason and when you're allowed to elaborate on them, or play against them, or make choices (about them) it becomes fun. Gyllenhaal is backing the little-known director to the hilt, with Prisoners their second collaboration on the trot following the as-yet unreleased Enemy. Based on the Jose Saramago novel, Gyllenhaal plays two roles in the erotic thriller, as a teacher and his unemployed actor doppelganger. It's almost unheard of for such a high-profile actor to shoot two movies back to back with a director so new to Hollywood, but Gyllenhaal has so much faith in his new collaborator from Quebec, he felt it was a risk worth taking. Jake Gyllenhaal and Hugh Jackman in a harrowing scene from the thriller Prisoners. "What happened was this incredible creative relationship, that when he asked me to come and play this role in Prisoners it was almost impossible to turn down," he says. I thought the script was amazing and I thought the part offered so many opportunities, but really, primarily it was that relationship and just moving on to the things that really feel important for life.  Gyllenhaal has consciously been pursuing more substantial roles, aware that his best films, including Brokeback Mountain and Donnie Darko, have come from his big gambles while his safe Hollywood choices such as the big budget Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time and The Day After Tomorrow haven't played to his strengths. "I've come to a place in my life, in my career where you have to listen to things beyond what other people are saying," Gyllenhaal explains. Villeneuve, nominated for a best foreign language Oscar in 2011 for Incendies ("I was sort of enraptured by that film," Gyllenhaal says) also attracted a top flight supporting cast including Oscar winner Melissa Leo as the suspect's mother and Viola Davis, Maria Bello and Terence Howard as panic-stricken parents who each deal with their fear, desperation and anxiety in very different ways. Skyfall cinematographer Roger Deakins - who has been nominated for an astonishing 10 Academy Awards but never won - shot the film. "There are all these people who are brilliant minds coming to something and they're going to bring something original - it's inevitable," he says. You don't have Melissa Leo, or Paul Dano, or Hugh Jackman, or Maria Bello, or Terence Howard or Roger Deakins or any of these people coming in and doing it the typical way. In any of the work they do. Oscar-nominated director Denis Villeneuve with his A-list stars on the set of Prisoners. Born into a showbusiness family - his father Stephen is a director (Losing Isaiah, Homegrown), mum Naomi Foner is a screenwriter (Running on Empty) and of course big sister Maggie is a movie star too - Gyllenhaal takes his craft very seriously. For his last film, the acclaimed police drama End of Watch, Gyllenhaal underwent five months of training including 12-hour long ride alongs in patrol cars up to three times a week. For Nightcrawler, which began production in LA the day after our interview, the actor dropped 10kg to reinforce the indie thriller's themes of spiritual and physical hunger. The plot is about a man drawn into the nocturnal world of freelance crime journalism. "It's so integral to the character that it's just part of the process for me," he explains. And that's pretty much all he'll say about the film because "it's easier to objectify about the ones in the past, rather than the ones you're about to journey into." For Prisoners, he spent countless hours researching interrogation techniques so he could conduct an intense 20-minute grilling of mentally challenged child abduction suspect Alex (Paul Dano), filled with threats, cajoling and manipulation, which was shot in a single take. "I saw some pretty heinous stuff in interrogation rooms and I saw some amazing work by detectives," Gyllenhaal says. Jake Gyllenhaal immersed himself in interrogation techniques during his research for Prisoners. I would just watch hundreds of hours of this stuff and write down questions and think about themes. I knew I was going to be working with such incredible actors that if I asked the questions and pushed them in certain ways they would respond. The stuff we did with Paul in that first interrogation I really pulled directly from interrogations that I saw. Jackman gives the more overt performance, as a father filled with desperation and rage, willing to do anything to save his daughter and her friend. It's among his most powerful work. "He really appreciates people who will push him to discover new things about himself and push him to places that he may be afraid of - people like that are really (energising) to him and that's what I love to do," Gyllenhaal says. The pair became firm friends on the set, and intend to catch up as both live in New York. Gyllenhaal's performance is more subtle. Villeneuve and the actor devised a backstory for Detective Loki - that he was an orphan and juvenile delinquent shuffled in and out of foster homes who sought out the comfortable familiarity of another institution, the police department, as a career. Bravely, none of this is directly laid out for the audience, but subtle clues about his history and internal demons are scattered throughout the film - from the first time we see him eating alone in a Chinese restaurant, to his tattoos, his barely concealed anger, and a nervous tic. Jackman says their shared background in the theatre meant both liked to rehearse and prepare intently so they had a firm basis on which to experiment and improvise when the camera is on. "He loves to do research and he loves to talk about things and he loves to dissect scene and I love that too," Jackman says of his co-star. Working with him was like playing great tennis, he's instinctive and when you're shooting he just allows it to be. Prisoners is now showing.