What’s it about?
Down on his luck and desperate to save his sick daughter, blue collar everyman and confirmed Good Bloke Ben Richards (Glen Powell) enters “The Running Man”, the most popular show on TV, in which contestants must survive 30 days while being hunted by professional assassins (assisted by the general public).
What’d we think?
It’s been a great year for Stephen King adaptations, and this (the second adaptation of the novel after the 1987 Schwarzenegger movie) continues the trend, delivering energetic action and rough chuckles alongside some timeless social commentary. A loving homage to the more mean-spirited and cynical action movies of the late 80s and early 90s, The Running Man taps into the cynicism and social commentary of it’s source and inspirations (Robocop, I’m looking at you) without ever forgetting that it’s supposed to be fun.
Edgar Wright was a great choice of director, his high-energy yet meticulous visual style is a perfect fit for the cyberpunk tone. There’s a lot crammed into each frame of the movie, with plenty of show-don’t-tell about exactly how crummy the setting is without needing to oversell it. Glen Powell does a great job playing the role of the action star as much as he plays the role of Ben Richards, hamming it up just enough that it never feels like he’s winking at the camera, you can tell that to some degree his character is always playing a part. He also carries most of the movie on his own, as most of his interactions with our ostensible antagonist (a wonderfully toothy Josh Brolin as the sleazy TV executive that convinces Ben to sign up for the game) basically take place over zoom calls. Colman Domingo serves (in every sense of the word) as the delightfully professional host of The Running Man, bouncing between joyously commentating the carnage, and earnestly engaging the audience with hilariously straightfaced updates when the show has decided it’s time for a dramatic moment.
The action is crisply prseneted and doled out in good measure, and while the social commentary isn’t anything new (which is commentary of its own), The Running Man is as solid a popcorn flick as you could ask for, and I’d heartily recommend it.
