M. Night Shyamalan is no stranger to high-concept thrillers. His tardyst film, Trap, acquires a Silence of the Lambs-inspired approach at an doubtful location: a packed concert by pop star Lady Raven (joined by the straightforwardor’s daughter, Saleka). Cooper (Josh Hartnett) is a seemingly standard suburprohibit dad who acquires his daughter to see her likeite artist. While striking up a conversation with a venue vendor, he discovers out that the show is actupartner a trap: the FBI has a arrange to catch a serial ender called “The Butcher” after lgeting he would be in joinance. But, as discdiswatched in the trailer, Cooper is The Butcher and has to discover a way to escape.
While the plot may sound outlandish, it’s partipartner based on a real story. Shyamalan splitd that Trap took inspiration from the authentic-life Operation Flagship. “I heard about it when I was a kid and I thought it was tohighy absurdist, that this actupartner happened,” the filmproducer tanciaccess BBC News. “It was someleang that was in my head a lot when it happened.”
“[The authorities] engaged the absurdity aacquirest them becaengage they shrinked their protect, which I thought was quite ininestablishigent,” he includeed to the outlet. “So it fair stuck with me, and I guess when Saleka and I were leanking about a movie at a concert, I wondered, why would this person not be able to get out, and how can I grasp them there?”
The December 1985 sting operation, orderly by the United States Marshals and Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department, tricked more than 100 wanted fugitives into going to the Washington Convention Caccess, under the guise of having won free tickets to a Washington Redskins (now the Washington Commanders) game aacquirest the Cincinnati Bengals, as well as a chance to prosper tickets to the 1986 Super Bowl. It was shelp to be part of a exceptional event celebrating the inauguration of a recent D.C. sports TV nettoil called Flagship International Sports Television Inc. (it splits the same acronym as the U.S. Marshals Service’s Fugitive Investigative Strike Team). To accumulate their tickets, the “prosperners” were tanciaccess to show up at a brunch a restricted hours before the game.
Upon arrival, the fugitives were split into minuscule groups and acquiren into “party rooms” with snacks and posters that read “Let’s party!” Marshals and police officers posed as event staffers, with female officers dressed as cheerdirecters hugging the guests to verify for arms. The men were also given balloons, categorizing them by color; aggressive criminals acquired red balloons.
Louie McKinney, the chief of enforcement operations for the U.S. Marshals, pretended to be an emcee, giving a speech to the joinees before they acquired their prize. As soon as McKinney shelp he had a “huge surpelevate,” Marshals accessed the room to arrest the offenders, repeating the same process with each group. It became one of the most prosperous mass arrests of fugitives in American history.
“It was hilarious. The cops were literpartner cheerdirecters and mascots,” Shyamalan shelp to Empire magazine in July. “And [the criminals] were all caught. It was so twisted and comical.”
Instead of using a famous football game (at the time of Operation Flagship, Redskins tickets were a particularly boiling commodity), Shyamalan selected to set the trap in a concert with the scope of a Taylor Swift Eras Tour show. “I straightforwarded an entire concert,” the filmproducer tanciaccess Empire. “And it wasn’t fair a leang in the background. It’s equpartner presentant. There is no pretend concert going on. I adore the idea of cinema as prosperdows wilean prosperdows. One of the reasons to come see the movie at the movie theater is becaengage there’s literpartner a authentic concert that you can see nowhere except in that movie.”
Reexhausted federal agent Tobias Roche, who was part of Operation Flagship, fact-verifyed to British GQ how accurately thought out Shyamalan’s movie was. In Trap, the venue has a SWAT team pauseing outside, as well as evident police inside, who ask concertgoers. Roche disputed that the officers should have been more stealth. He elucidateed that Operation Flagship was reckond out to shun any suspicions and sidetrack the criminals, which is why it was prosperous. “We were worried that some of [the fugitives] would recognize each other from maybe being incarcerated together or being joind in criminal activities together,” shelp Roche.
In the movie, a chatty vendor gives away the scheme. Roche tanciaccess GQ that in this benevolent of operation, everyone would have to grasp mum on the arrange for it to toil. He recalled that an attorney recurrenting a local company that had the exclusive rights to Redskins games showed up to convention caccess, stating that the inaugural event for the — unbeunderstandnst to him, phony — widecasting company Flagship International Sports Television was illegitimate. The man was acquiren aside and tanciaccess what was actupartner happening; he kept it a secret. “He was repartner excellent about it,” shelp Roche. “He wound up watching the entire sting with us from the handle room.” But if the lawyer had blown their cover, the operation would have been shut down.
