RIOTUS

DrewNote: superior to the 1987 adaptation of the Stephen King story, this film takes a big swing at the intersection of politics, pop culture, media manipulation, and our mass addiction to violence. It has a lot to say about us and our times.

Ben Richards (Glen Powell) is a guy who’s run out of second chances. His inability to “go along to get along” makes him unemployable, just as his baby girl Katy is deathly ill and needs medicine he can’t afford. His wife Sheila (Jayme Lawson) works in a disreputable club and they are almost destitute. Desperate, he takes a chance on applying for one of The Network’s cruel game shows. The only one he refuses to join is The Running Man.

Guess where he ends up?

Along with Laughlin (Katy O’Brian) and Tim (Martin Herlihy), Richards is flung into a murderous game of hide and seek. Every day he survives, he earns a payout for his wife and daughter, plus a bonus if any hunters or their support team get killed along the way; if he can avoid the five hunters for thirty days, he’ll win a billion dollars.

Nobody has ever won.

It’s all about providing a good show, but as the raw malice of producer Dan Killian (Josh Brolin) comes into focus, Richards realizes it’s not the hunters (led by a masked Lee Pace) he has to fear–it’s the mob that’s been primed to hate him, with AI deepfakes inciting them to unthinking rage.

Armed with nothing but a few disguises, some help from an anti-Network resistance (including Michael Cera as a hardcore survivalist type from a certain town in Maine), and the fickle “assistance” Killian offers, Richards faces an uphill battle surviving the hunters and their floating eyeball robots. But he made himself two promises going in: he would make sure his wife and child would have the money to make a better life, and Killian’s empire would come crashing down. Well, he’d better start running.

Edgar Wright, who co-wrote the screenplay with Michael Bacall, delivers a taut, fast-paced thriller that has more on its mind than big explosions or bullets shot through doorways. Powell is a knot of fury in the movie, angry first at the world that denies him a chance to make a living and then at the powers behind the scenes that exploit his rage to create entertainment. His performance might seem like a hammerblow from the start, but Powell gets who Richards is and gives us the emotional weight we need to make his character work. That way, through Ben’s eyes, Wright gives us a first-hand look at how audiences are tricked into serving The Network, both as accomplices and as consumers, even as all-seeing surveillance tech has the runners at the hunters’ mercy. In other words, privacy doesn’t exist for anyone.

What at first might seem like outrage at the corporations and government forces that stifle freedom in the name of promoting it becomes something else. Wright isn’t only angry at those shadowy folks behind the curtain; he’s just as angry at us for allowing this to go unchallenged. If we don’t stand up for ourselves, we’re just another commodity bought and exploited and sold by The Network’s real-life counterparts. It’s a bold statement but Wright has the chops to pull it off.

With supporting work from stalwarts like William H. Macy, Colman Domingo, and Emilia Jones, not to mention Daniel Ezra (who’s absolutely fantastic), the movie builds to a climax that may invite some debate. As in–is this a fakeout, after all the phony AI we’ve seen? Or is it the real deal?

If nothing else, it will provoke some interesting conversations after the credits roll. Just be sure to go see it before a flood of higher profile movies (hiya, Wicked: For Good!) buries it at the box office.

We give this eight and a half eyeball robots out of ten.