the hunt movie review rotten tomatoes

‘The Hunt’: Film Review

An intense, over-the-top satire of partisan politics taken to its most dangerous extreme, Craig Zobel's controversial thriller delivers the excitement, if not necessarily the deeper social critique.

By Peter Debruge

Peter Debruge

Chief Film Critic

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Last summer, even before the public had gotten a chance to see it, humans-hunting-humans thriller “ The Hunt ” became a target for pundits on both sides of the gun control debate, when mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas, prompted critics to consider the media’s role in glorifying violence. In response, Universal ripped director Craig Zobel ’s movie from its Sept. 27 release date and rescheduled the thriller for spring 2020, making room for national mourning in the wake of the horrific events, only to turn around and use the controversy as an unconventional marketing hook.

While not nearly as incendiary as the early coverage made it out to be, “The Hunt” gives skeptics ample ammunition to condemn this twisted riff on “The Most Dangerous Game,” in which a posse of heavily armed liberal elites get carried away exercising their Second Amendment rights against a dozen “deplorables” — as the hunters label their prey, adopting Hillary Clinton’s dismissive, dehumanizing term for the “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic” contingent whose fringe beliefs have found purchase with President Trump. No matter who you ask, the “right to bear arms” was never intended as justification for Americans to turn their guns against those they disagree with, whereas that’s the premise from which “Lost” creator Damon Lindelof and co-writer Nick Cuse depart here — partisan politics taken to their most irreconcilable extremes — as Zobel proves just the director to execute such a tight, well-oiled shock-a-thon.

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Sure enough, Zobel, Lindelof and producer Jason Blum (riding high on last month’s “The Invisible Man”) have wrought a gory, hard-R exploitation movie masquerading as political satire, one that takes unseemly delight in dispatching yahoos on either end of the spectrum via shotgun, crossbow, hand grenade and all manner of hastily improvised weapons. The words “trigger warning” may not have been invented with “The Hunt” in mind, but they’ve seldom seemed more apt in describing a film that stops just shy of fomenting civil war as it pits Left against Right, Blue (bloods) against Red (necks), in a bloody battle royale that reduces both sides to ridiculous caricatures.

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And yet, “The Hunt” is a good deal smarter — and no more outrageous — than most studio horror films, while its political angle at least encourages debate, suggesting that there’s more to this hot potato than mere provocation. Let’s assume we can all agree that there’s too much violence in American movies today. The danger of “The Hunt” isn’t that the project will inspire copycat behavior (the premise is too far-fetched for that), but rather that it drives a recklessly combustible wedge into the tinderbox of extreme partisanship, creating a false equivalency between, say, Whole Foods-shopping white-collar liberals and racist, conspiracy-minded right-wingers.

Back in August 2017, two years before the shootings that put heat on “The Hunt,” Trump sent a troubling message to the whole country when he responded to a murder at a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., by insisting that there were “very fine people on both sides.” Zobel and Lindelof explore the opposite view: namely, that the actions and opinions of the two sides can be equally deplorable.

There are no good guys in “The Hunt,” just hunters and hunted, in which both parties are played by character actors whom viewers might recognize from TV. A few have slightly higher profiles (the lefties are led by a lunatic named Athena, stunt-cast with Hilary Swank ), although the movie establishes early on that off-screen status does not confer greater survivability. One of the film’s pranks is to surprise audiences with cleverly timed and diabolically creative “kills” whenever possible, and more than once, faces you may recognize explode right before your eyes, all but splattering the camera in the process. It’s revolting, sure, but nowhere near as upsetting as the “torture porn” genre that preceded Blumhouse’s entry into the horror arena and, frankly, far less offensive than the psychological violence perpetrated by Zobel’s 2012 indie “Compliance,” in which a faceless caller, claiming to be a police officer, convinces a fast-food manager to detain and degrade one of her employees.

Zobel has directed just one feature since then, “Z for Zachariah,” focusing instead on prestige TV, and it’s clear from an early scene aboard a private jet en route to the Manor, where Athena and her guests plan to do their hunting, that the practice has honed his ability to balance between squirm-inducing dialogue and high-stakes suspense. Meanwhile, the film’s plotting is pure Lindelof, who keeps us guessing by dropping clues to “Manorgate,” as the conspiracy surrounding Athena’s activities is referred to among nut-job bloggers like Gary (Ethan Suplee) and Don (Wayne Duvall), only to reveal a more elaborate program than even they could have imagined.

This much “The Hunt” establishes early: Roughly a dozen deplorables (again, the film’s word for them, conveyed via an on-screen text conversation that goes viral among the same network that gave credibility to Pizzagate, prompting a vigilante to take action) are drugged and kidnapped from around the country and flown out to an undisclosed location (not at all where they think). They come to in the middle of a field, where an ominous crate sits. Little by little, using what’s implied to be their limited intellect, they manage to unlock their bite harnesses (a torture porn touch, to be sure) and arm themselves, but it’s not until their unseen hosts start shooting that they put two and two together.

Although the liberals may have the upper hand at first, they’re not any smarter than their quarry, and the movie hooks us by suggesting anything can happen, and following through on that promise with a series of inventive booby traps. If you’ve ever wondered what it looks like when someone steps on a mine or lands face up in a Viet Cong-style punji trap, Zobel and his visual effects team have answers, relying on a graphic mix of CG and practical gore effects to turn such preposterous situations into genuinely startling moments.

Naturally, the project recalls Jordan Peele’s recent “Get Out,” which implicated well-mannered white people in a nefarious plot to steal the brains and skills of unsuspecting African Americans, as well as 1995’s early Cameron Diaz starrer “The Last Supper,” wherein a group of liberals lured contemptible conservatives to dinner, only to poison them when they refused to see reason. (There’s also a soupçon of “MADtv” star Ike Barinholtz’s irreconcilable-differences satire “The Oath,” so it’s fitting that he should appear as one of the hunted here.) But none of those movies took its premise nearly as deep into the realm of horror as Lindelof and Zobel do here, which is the potential advantage of a film that’s rather anemic in its social commentary — there’s not much depth beyond such easy punchlines as a self-hating liberal saying, “White people, we’re the f—in’ worst” — but that delivers on the visceral thrills of trying to survive a rigged game.

As the umpteenth variation on Richard Connell’s “The Most Dangerous Game,” however, “The Hunt” is one of the most effective executions yet (it surpasses the Cannes-laureled “Bacurau,” in theaters now, but drags along too much baggage to best last year’s sleeper-hit “Ready or Not”). Regardless of one’s personal political affiliations, it’s hard not to root for the victims here, and one quickly distinguishes herself from the pack of “Deliverance”-style caricatures: Crystal May Creesy (Betty Gilpin of “Glow”), a MacGyver-skilled military veteran who served in Afghanistan and whose distrust of any and everyone makes her uniquely suited for a final showdown with Athena.

After all the buildup, that scene inevitably disappoints in its attempt to explain its own mythology, though the well-matched womano a womano confrontation between Gilpin and Swank is worth the price of admission. Culturally, it does no one any good to stoke discord between two contentious parties, but when the conflict reduces to one-on-one — and “The Hunt” stops pretending to be a parable about modern politics — it’s easy to appreciate the efficient 90-minute horror-fantasy for what it is: not a model for violent behavior in the real world, but an extreme outlet for pent-up frustrations on both sides.

Reviewed at London Screening Room, March 5, 2020. MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 90 MIN.

• Production: A Universal Pictures release of a Blumhouse production. Producers: Jason Blum, Damon Lindelof. Executive producers: Nick Cuse, Steven R. Molen, Craig Zobel. Co-producer: Jennifer Scudder Trent.
• Crew: Director: Craig Zobel. Screenplay: Damon Lindelof, Nick Cuse. Camera: Darran Tiernan. Editor: Jane Rizzo. Music: Nathan Barr.
• With: Ike Barinholtz, Betty Gilpin, Emma Roberts, Hilary Swank , Wayne Duvall, Christopher Berry, Sturgill Simpson, Kate Nowlin, Amy Madigan, Reed Birney, Glenn Howerton, Steve Coulter, Dean J. West, Vince Pisani, Teri Wyble, Steve Mokate, Sylvia Grace Crim, Jason Kirkpatrick, Macon Blair, J.C. MacKenzie.

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The Hunt Review: A Sharp, Even-Handed Satire That’s Also Gory Fun

In August 2019, the theatrical release of Craig Zobel’s The Hunt was indefinitely delayed. This was the result of a controversy in the wake of the movie’s first trailer (which admittedly did put an emphasis on the “horror” side of the horror/comedy), and the suggestion that “Hollywood” was pushing a blockbuster advocating violence against conservatives. Of course, all of these various attacks came from people who hadn’t actually seen the film, and the reactions were entirely based on the limited footage released and the studio-published plot description.

Now it’s almost exactly seven months later, and while nothing in the world has really changed, and nothing in the movie has changed, The Hunt is arriving in theaters nationwide. That fact alone makes one wonder what the point of the controversy/delay was in the first place, but there is an extra kicker: not only is the film a smart, even-handed satire that plays no favorites when poking fun, the way that the narrative surrounding the release ultimately lines up with one of the core messages of the story is so deeply ironic that it is essentially meta.

Written by Damon Lindelof and Nick Cuse, and initially inspired by the wild conspiracy theories that populate right wing message boards, The Hunt brings one of these radical ideas to life with the execution of an event dubbed Manorgate. Orchestrated by the mysterious billionaire CEO Athena (Hilary Swank), the “game” finds a group of strangers kidnapped, drugged, and let loose on the property of a vast estate where they are hunted by Athena’s rich, liberal friends. None of them have any specific idea as to why they were targeted, though they all generally possess conservative values.

While just about everybody is sincerely freaked out and looking for an exit, the only one keeping her wits about her is the enigmatic Crystal a.k.a. Snowball (Betty Gilpin). Of those being hunted, she is uniquely skilled to not only adapt to her environment, but also take the fight to the hunters.

The Hunt finds ways to both be grounded in the real world, and impressively silly.

The Hunt is a film that definitely benefits from having an audience that knows as little about it as possible going in, as the twists and surprises it has in store come flying at you immediately, and it’s fascinating to simply let the movie reveal itself to you. A big part of what makes it so compelling is a unique approach to world-building, which both leans into the boundary-pushing horror/comedy elements while still keeping a foot firmly planted in reality. As everything unfolds, it’s easy to recognize the news stories that clearly inspired the larger ideas behind the plot (some of them specifically namedropped), and at the same time it’s clear that Craig Zobel, Damon Lindelof, and Nick Cuse have a blast taking those ideas to their most extreme points without ever breaking them.

To that end, this is a movie that definitely doesn’t lean away from its R-rating, which is something that winds up serving both aspects of the tone throughout. The first act alone, featuring the start of Manorgate, is a fantastic representation of this. Put into the minds of the characters that find themselves waking up on the ground gagged in a mysterious location, you immediately sympathize with the terror that they are experiencing – but then once things start going absolutely haywire The Hunt starts to have its fun. In certain moments it causes you to start laughing simply by throwing a series of surprises directly into your face, and in others it’s about a certain level of gratuitousness at which you can’t help but giggle.

If you have strong political views, but can also laugh at yourself, you’ll enjoy The Hunt.

Like any horror movie or any comedy, there is a subjective nature to the material, as not everybody digs on bloody violence, and everybody’s interpretation of the word “funny” is different – but what’s particularly interesting about The Hunt is how it engages with an individual audience member’s political leanings. While the controversy surrounding the film suggests particular bias, the reality is that this movie is for everybody, and particularly the politically invested… provided that they have the capacity to laugh at themselves. It takes aim at much of the ridiculousness that can be found in both right wing and left wing ideologies, but more importantly it targets commonalities between the two sides and satirically exposes them, allowing the movie-goers an interesting opportunity for self-reflection.

There are certain moments where it tries a bit too hard, particularly when throwing around zeitgeist terms that have a tendency to clang and feel unnatural. Far more often than not, however, it clicks, and those who allow themselves to be open to it may even gain an certain amount of perspective they may not have had prior to seeing the movie – which is truly one of the greatest gifts of satire.

Betty Gilpin delivers an excellent performance as part of a well-utilized ensemble.

The cherry on top of the Hunt sundae is that audiences are treated to an amazing big screen breakthrough performance from Betty Gilpin. Fans of shows like Nurse Jackie and GLOW are certainly already well-aware of what the actor can do, as she has been doing great work for years, but she is given the opportunity to shine as Crystal in a way we haven’t seen before in features. It’s a touch strange, as the character is purposefully maintained as an enigma throughout the film, but she is captivating from the moment she is introduced – seen from afar getting her bearings by creating a makeshift compass with a pin, a leaf, and a pool of water. Over the course of the movie we only learn scant details about her past, but she makes for a compelling heroine with an iron-tight grip on her emotions and awesome fortitude.

While revealing too much about them would be a disservice to The Hunt and your experience watching the movie, the rest of the ensemble is also outstanding and well-utilized – not to mention that any character actor geek is going to have a field day simply identifying the recognizable faces. Very much delivering on the unexpected, Emma Roberts and Ike Barinholtz are standouts among the supporting cast with roles guaranteed to surprise, and Hilary Swank ’s Athena winds up being a fantastically layered antagonist, but we also get some fun times with Ethan Suplee, Glenn Howerton, Amy Madigan, Wayne Duvall, Macon Blair, and more in diverse and surprising roles. At the end of the day, though, this is Betty Gilpin’s show, and she rules.

There is a weird number of people who seem to think that they have The Hunt totally figured out sight unseen, but it should be made clear: they don’t. What this movie is actually about is the danger and consequences that come with jumping to extreme conclusions without sufficient evidence, and that fact alone will hopefully get some blind detractors to purchase a ticket and give it a chance. Provided you go into it with openness and are willing to hear what it has to say, you won’t be disappointed.

Eric Eisenberg is the Assistant Managing Editor at CinemaBlend. After graduating Boston University and earning a bachelor’s degree in journalism, he took a part-time job as a staff writer for CinemaBlend, and after six months was offered the opportunity to move to Los Angeles and take on a newly created West Coast Editor position. Over a decade later, he's continuing to advance his interests and expertise. In addition to conducting filmmaker interviews and contributing to the news and feature content of the site, Eric also oversees the Movie Reviews section, writes the the weekend box office report (published Sundays), and is the site's resident Stephen King expert. He has two King-related columns.

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Directed by Craig Zobel

The ultimate human hunting experience

Twelve strangers wake up in a clearing. They don't know where they are—or how they got there. In the shadow of a dark internet conspiracy theory, ruthless elitists gather at a remote location to hunt humans for sport. But their master plan is about to be derailed when one of the hunted turns the tables on her pursuers.

Betty Gilpin Hilary Swank Ethan Suplee Teri Wyble Ike Barinholtz Wayne Duvall Emma Roberts Christopher Berry Sturgill Simpson Kate Nowlin Amy Madigan Reed Birney Glenn Howerton Steve Coulter Dean J. West Vince Pisani Steve Mokate Sylvia Grace Crim Jason Kirkpatrick Macon Blair J.C. MacKenzie Tadasay Young Hannah Alline Jim Klock Usman Ally Ned Yousef Iyad Hajjaj Justin Hartley Hans Marrero Show All… Charli Slaughter Lucas Eagans Adoria K Lewis Lucy Golden Juan Gaspard Giovanni Cohea Troy Roker Jeff Brockton Yosef Kasnetzkov Mikel Albagdadi Tirol Palmer Alexander Babara Ariel Eliaz Walker Babington Martin Harris

Director Director

Craig Zobel

Producers Producers

Jason Blum Damon Lindelof Julie Goldstein Jennifer Scudder Trent

Writers Writers

Nick Cuse Damon Lindelof

Casting Casting

Terri Taylor Sarah Domeier Lindo Ally Conover Amelia Chen Miley Elizabeth Coulon

Editor Editor

Cinematography cinematography.

Darran Tiernan

Assistant Directors Asst. Directors

Lars P. Winther Steve Lonano

Executive Producers Exec. Producers

Nick Cuse Craig Zobel Steven R. Molen Couper Samuelson Jeanette Volturno

Lighting Lighting

Kevin Slark Brian Posslenzny Sergio Villegas

Camera Operators Camera Operators

Greg Morris John S. Moyer

Production Design Production Design

Matthew Munn

Art Direction Art Direction

Jason Baldwin Stewart Nealy Orillion

Set Decoration Set Decoration

Monique Champagne Dwight Stanley Zac Tate Brian S. Freeman Cassie Catalanotto Bethany Horning Jessica Stumpf

Visual Effects Visual Effects

Ed Hawkins Jenné Marie Guerra John Gibson

Stunts Stunts

Jackson Spidell Heidi Moneymaker Jeff Brockton Hank Amos Taryn Terrell Ashley Nicole Hudson Ted Barba Joanna Bennett Nick Benseman Todd Bloomer Chris Bryant Taran Butler Chelsea Bruland Nick Brandon Nicolas Bosc Cara Marie Chooljian Caitlin Dechelle Bruce Concepcion Matt Cipro Jacob Dewitt Jared S. Eddo Jeff Galpin Tyler Galpin Arturo Dickey Casey Hendershot Chris J. Fanguy Sarah Irwin Juliene Joyner Richard T. Hoover Nito Larioza Jean Claude Leuyer Hans Marrero Monica Lopez Aleman Brooklyn Proctor Met Salih Kevin Reid William Scharpf Preston Schrag Michael Yahn John Zimmerman Amy Lynn Tuttle Adam Horwitz Troy Roker Luke Hawx

Composer Composer

Nathan Barr

Sound Sound

Leslie Bloome Ryan Collison Nick Seaman Laura Heinzinger Joanna Fang Robert C. Bigelow Rich Bologna Will Files Diego Perez Mark Patterson Mark Paterson Phil Barrie

Costume Design Costume Design

David Tabbert

Makeup Makeup

Leah Vautrot Ma Kalaadevi Ananda Lauren Thomas Stacey Perry

Hairstyling Hairstyling

Donita Miller Emily Stegeman Dee Leveque Tony Ward

Blumhouse Productions dentsu White Rabbit Productions Universal Pictures

Primary Language

Spoken languages.

Arabic Croatian English

Releases by Date

10 mar 2020, 11 mar 2020, 13 mar 2020, 09 apr 2020, 16 apr 2020, 23 apr 2020, 14 may 2020, 21 may 2020, 28 may 2020, 11 jun 2020, 18 jun 2020, 22 jun 2020, 31 jul 2020, 13 aug 2020, 17 feb 2021, 20 mar 2020, 27 mar 2020, 10 aug 2020, 30 sep 2020, 26 oct 2022, 09 jun 2020, 06 jul 2020, 03 aug 2020, releases by country.

• Theatrical MA15+
• Theatrical 15+
• Physical DVD, Blu-ray
• Theatrical 12
• Digital VOD
• Physical DVD & Blu-Ray
• Digital 16 OCS
• Digital 18 Amazon Prime
• Theatrical Κ-18
• Theatrical 16
• Theatrical 18
• Digital VM14

Netherlands

Russian federation.

• Digital 16+
• Theatrical M18 (edited)
• Theatrical 15

South Korea

• Physical 15 DVD
• Premiere ArcLight Hollywood
• Theatrical R
• Physical R DVD, Blu-ray

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Popular reviews

Review by clementine ★★★½ 17

me vs trying to figure out what side of the political spectrum this movie is on

Review by maria ★★★ 4

i can't say with which of these two i identify the most... the pig or the dude who asks where the hand sanitizer is

Review by hollie amanda ★★ 6

this isn’t even a movie americans just be like that

Review by davidehrlich ★★★ 11

“The Hunt” begins with a bunch of NPR-addicted neoliberals poaching a wild pack of Trump-worshipping MAGA types for bloodsport. Director Craig Zobel’s ultra-violent satirical update of “The Most Dangerous Game” aspires to be the movie that America needs right now; it’s a giddy slaughterhouse of mirrors that hopes to bring this country together and make it great again by reflecting the absurdity of us vs them resentment. The movie literalizes the rhetoric of a culture war that has divided the United States into “globalist cucks who run the deep state” and “redneck deplorables” with little wiggle room in between. Blumhouse’s latest blast of low-budget social commentary tries to split the difference between centrists and nihilists — between “bothsidesism” and “nosidesism”—…

Review by aaron ★★★½ 8

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

okay a few points: - she kinda snapped  - I blinked and emma roberts was gone  - I LOWKEY LOVED THIS IM SO SORRY FILMBROS

Review by matt lynch ★★½ 2

Look I'll give this credit for a commitment to cheap thrills and, like everyone else is saying, Betty Gilpin was a lot of fun. But this is mostly just kind of smug in its calling out of what's allegedly dangerous hypocrisy on both sides, and the caricaturing it has to do in order to make that argument -- which is exactly the kind of lazy shorthand that generally gets labelled satire these days -- is consistently eyeroll-inducing.

Review by Jay ★ 11

the closest were gonna get to glenn howerton as patrick bateman i guess

Review by ˗ˏˋ suspirliam ˊˎ˗ ★★★½ 7

the way that this actually kinda served and now i want a grilled cheese

Review by DirkH ★ 11

Satire (noun): the use of humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.

Farce (noun): a comic dramatic work using buffoonery and horseplay and typically including crude characterization and ludicrously improbable situations.

Cause the makers clearly picked one and made the other.

Review by Josh Lewis ★★ 1

Sorta like Battle Royale but with the potent expression of adolescent rage concerning adult condescension and senseless violence replaced with a bunch of broad American culture war signifiers. Not even half as provocative as it thinks it is and the action mostly sucks.

Review by 🎃🔥Mr. Like🔥🎃 ★★★½ 9

Rotten Tomatoes: 50 Metacritic Metascore: 54% IMDB: 6.5

Release Date : 13 March 2020 Distributor : Universal Pictures Budget : $14M Worldwide Gross : $6.5M Total Film Awards : TBD

2020 Ranked

Crystal : "Cigarettes are $6 in Arkansas. YOU DONE FUCKED UP BITCH!!”

SYNOPSIS: Twelve strangers wake up in a clearing. They don't know where they are, or how they got there. They don't know they've been chosen - for a very specific purpose - The Hunt.

I still held out hope that it would be released eventually following its cancellation last September because of the political backlash it received, and luckily Universal still had the guts to do so. In fact, their recent media spots have only exploited the controversy of the cancellation/delay…

Review by trin ★★ 4

the hook of this movie for me was emma and then BOOM

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The Hunt (2020) | Film Review

Aaron B. Peterson March 13, 2020

The Most Dangerous Game, Hard Target, The Hunger Games – hunting human beings for sport is not a novel concept. And party conflicts, both real and online (which is only reality based on your perception of it), are also nothing new. Political division between Red and Blue has been around for quite some time. Yet the basic premise for Blumhouse’s latest topical nightmare – The Hunt – feels somewhat fresh and indicative of the moment we are currently living in. You know, the one where seemingly civilized people are more likely to erupt into an uncomfortable game of “who’s outrage is bigger” or attack a person’s character with cheap shots and rhetoric rather than search for common ground.

The Hunt kicks things off immediately on a private jet where the Have-Nots (very much implying rednecks or anyone with a love of guns or immigration reform on the Red side of the political divide) have been doped and dumped for a private excursion elsewhere. Meanwhile, the Haves (yes, these are the rich, better-than-you, everything is a cause, SJWs of the Blue side) arranged this little getaway – rumored around the internet to be known as The Manor – where they intend to hunt and slaughter these “deplorables” before retiring to a mansion for a weekend of laughs.

A cast of many familiar actors afford us plenty of people to cheer on in the early goings, but the one the Blues hadn’t quite counted on is the resourcefully dangerous Crystal (Betty Gilpin). A woman of means, determination, and sheer ass-beating ability, Crystal sees this game for what it is and has no intention of playing by their rules.

The political debates on either side sparked in The Hunt are nowhere near as nuanced as Knives Out , these are blatant barbs launched willy-nilly. Gender identification, the 2 nd Amendment, climate change; the gang’s all here and their arrival is about as subtle as a jackhammer during a Christmas prayer. Which is about what one would expect when Damon Lindelof (along with Nick Cuse) is one of the screenwriters.

Lindelof is one of the most literal writers out there, blindly cascading past metaphors as if they were jagged spikes laid wildly along his path of personal ideology. Though there is an effort to paint a “fair picture” of both sides of political parties, it would be a disservice if I failed to acknowledge that aside from Crystal, there is barely a blip of comparable intelligent life on the Red aisle present.

Those concerns aside, The Hunt is hellacious fun! From the opening minutes until the final frame, director Craig Zobel keeps the film moving at a blistering pace. We kick things off with our characters deep in their predicament, as if SAW began in a field and instead of a puppet, rich hippies rigged all of the puzzles. From there on out, it is one set-piece to the next, and eventually we come to follow Crystal as she turns the tables and begins a hunt of her own.

Though there is a notable cast of actors here (2-time Oscar winner Hilary Swank being the obvious standout as the devious leader of the pack) it cannot be misstated: Betty Gilpin IS the star of The Hunt. Each and every frame she is on screen, Gilpin dominates the camera like The Rock dominates Instagram. Fans of Netflix’s GLOW are fully aware of Gilpin’s talent, but her fluidly brutal action sequences and electrifyingly charismatic performance – akin to unleashing a wild lion into a mildly prepared suburb – is worth the price of admission itself. Her final battle is already a contender for the best movie fight of the year, and it’s only March. Rarely do I screen a film and walk out thinking we need another franchise, but if any filmmakers are looking for a new action star: Betty Gilpin is ready and waiting to beat your ass.

The Hollywood Outsider Review Score

Performances - 8.5, screenplay - 5.5, production - 7.

The Hunt is a rip-roaring good time despite its political yammering, led by a monstrously charismatic performance from Betty Gilpin.

Tags betty gilpin damon lindelof hilary swank the hunt

About Aaron B. Peterson

'The Hunt' reactions: Controversial new social satire is 'heavy-handed' but 'undeniably delivers the goods'

It was apparent going in that “The Hunt” would be jaw-droppingly controversial, given its plot: Liberal “elites” hunt and kill conservative “deplorables” for sport . But is it any good?

Predictably, reaction to the savage social satire – which finally hits theaters Friday after being shelved in the wake of mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas – is as sharply divided as the current political climate. Reviews are 54% positive on Rotten Tomatoes.

USA TODAY’s Brian Truitt praised the film as “ an equal-opportunity offender that forgoes partisanship to poke bloody, gory fun at everybody,” while also predicting it will “tick off those with a thin skin and without an open mind.” 

“This action-drenched roller coaster of a film tries to have its cake and eat it too when it comes to generating a tidal wave of violence,” The Hollywood Reporter’s Todd McCarthy writes. “But it undeniably delivers the goods when it comes to action and impudence.” 

“There’s more to this hot potato than mere provocation ,” says Variety’s Peter Debruge, who notes that The Hunt “is a good deal smarter – and no more outrageous –— than most studio horror films.”

Need a break? Play the USA TODAY Daily Crossword Puzzle.

'The Hunt' controversy, explained: What you need to know about the movie slammed by Trump

'The Hunt' might tick you off:  Here's why that's a good thing

Others were less convinced. " ‘The Hunt’ is not great satire or even a great film. It's an unstylish and heavy-handed horror-thriller that turns into a revenge gore-fest as it mocks everyone with a big clumsy paw ,” says Mark Kennedy of The Associated Press.

“The movie is not just lazy but a lie ,” says Slate’s Sam Adams. “It feels like the work of Hollywood liberals bending over so far backward to seem nonpartisan that they end up buying into the right-wing canard that the political divide and the class divide are one and the same.”  

" 'The Hunt'  lacks the courage of its presumed convictions , displaying no more than a determination to make as much cash as possible by exploiting national divisions less covetous individuals are despairing of rather than monetizing,” Kenneth Turan of Los Angeles Times wrote.

But critics were united in their love for Betty Gilpin (“GLOW”) as a distrusting Afghanistan vet who fights back.

Gilpin plays the heroine Crystal “with almost sociopathic cool in an inspired and strange performance that splits the difference between Linda Hamilton and "No Country for Old Men" baddie Anton Chigurh,” says IndieWire’s David Ehrlich.

“ The movie’s secret weapon and its saving grace,” writes Monica Castillo of RogerEbert.com.

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The Hunt Is a Gleeful Exploitation Flick Ruined by Delusions of Relevance

The best take on The Hunt comes from its own main character, Crystal, a Mississippi car-rental employee and veteran who’s one of a dozen people who are abducted and stalked for sport for reasons initially unclear. Crystal — played by GLOW ’s Betty Gilpin with the kind of delectably unflappable timing ’80s action franchises were once built on — muses that interpreting the reasoning behind what’s been happening to her depends on whether the people responsible are “smart pretending to be idiots or idiots pretending to be smart.” Technically, she’s talking about her trigger-happy captors, a group of wealthy liberals searching for kicks and catharsis by killing a curated selection of members of the alt-right. But it’s an observation that, while bluntly stated, works just as well when applied to the movie she’s at the center of.

If you take The Hunt as the former, then it’s just a nasty exploitation flick, a riff on “The Most Dangerous Game” with a thin veneer of contemporary context. But it’s almost impossible to see it as anything but the latter — a splattery satire that’s actually trying to say something about the polarized moment in which we live. Courtesy of the conservative ire the film attracted before its initial planned release last September, ire that made its way up to the attention of the president , the garbled commentary that The Hunt offers up is pretty much guaranteed to be taken more seriously than the creative team behind it (including director Craig Zobel and writers Nick Cuse and Damon Lindelof) likely ever expected. There’s a bountiful, extremely 2020 sort of irony to the way The Hunt depicts cancel culture, given that the movie itself experienced a ludicrous temporary cancellation. It’s a two-hour testament to the perils of casually throwing around terms like “deplorables” and “godless elite” without actually appreciating how little meaning they may have, and how much baggage they’ve nevertheless accrued.

The script from The Hunt often feels like it was generated by pulling randomly from a word cloud from hell, with both sides spitting internet invective at one another like armies of Twitter bots — “cuck,” “snowflake,” “crisis actors,” “hick.” The hunted are a collection of white nationalists, Fox News fans, big-game hunters, and homophobes who wake up in the middle of the woods to find themselves being armed and then being shot at, as though every message board conspiracy theory they’d ever delved into were true. The hunters, led by Athena (Hilary Swank), are high-minded, high-income hypocrites who all take pride in their progressive conscientiousness (“Ava DuVernay just liked one of my posts!” is one of the quips that actually lands) while barely tamping down their vitriolic disdain. The film’s canniest insight is to have its vengeful pursuers insist on trying to get their prey to confess to their respective transgressions before they’re killed, because being told they’re right would be a truer reward than the self-righteous murders that inevitably follow.

The Hunt isn’t a total mishap, not with Gilpin being as good as she is and with Zobel’s gleeful aptitude for violence, but that’s what’s so exasperating about it. It has a habit of getting in its own way with trollish tendencies whenever it starts to build momentum. It’s regrettable that, despite all of its jabs at relevance, the movie has no desire to actually dig into the details of the anger felt by either side of the bloodsport event it imagines. In The Hunt , both sides are treated as equally foolish, South Park style, just snobs and rubes — which feels unbearably glib when the sins of one side are outrageously fictional and the sins of the other draw inspiration from real world examples like the Unite the Right rally and the Westboro Baptist Church. In order to present its political divide as a fundamentally cultural one, it settles on a group of characters who appear to have no direct skin in the game, and then treats the idea that might actually care anyway as unfathomable. For the people on screen, issues like racism and economic inequality amount to just cause for yelling, aside from the family of refugees rushed through a scene as an admission that there are people who have it bad, they’re just far away. It’s a privileged child’s view of current events, not to mention a conveniently white-skewing one.

The ideological incoherence of The Hunt is especially frustrating given that it’s heading to play in theaters alongside Juliano Dornelles and Kleber Mendonça Filho’s rollicking Bacurau , an infinitely sharper story about the hunting of humans for entertainment, and proof that a movie can have something on its mind without surrendering its exploitation bona fides. In the film, a group of armed Americans (and the odd European) who are really desperate to shoot someone embark on a bit of murder tourism — but they go abroad, with their chosen target being a small town in the Brazilian sertão that they assume won’t be missed. It’s the town, not the killers, on which the narrative is centered, and it’s the town that emerges as its own vivid character, a pragmatically inclusive community with a storied history and a gritty determination to take care of its own that was established long before the hunters arrived. Bacurau is an anti-colonialist war cry, a suspensefully bloody romp, and an ode to a distinctively Brazilian outpost capable of standing fast in the face of all comers. One can only imagine what Trump would tweet about this movie — not that he’d ever be likely to watch it, given the subtitles.

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• DVD & Streaming
• Action/Adventure , Horror

Content Caution

In Theaters

• March 13, 2020
• Betty Gilpin as Crystal; Ike Barinholtz as Staten Island; Wayne Duvall as Don; Ethan Suplee as Gary; Emma Roberts as Yoga Pants; Christopher Berry; Sturgill Simpson as Vanilla Nice; Kate Nowlin as Big Red; Amy Madigan as Ma; Reed Birney as Pop; Glenn Howerton as Richard; Steve Coulter as The Doctor

Home Release Date

• March 20, 2020
• Craig Zobel

Distributor

• Universal Pictures

Movie Review

The attack was as swift as it was brutal. It didn’t matter that they didn’t really know anything about their adversary: What they thought they knew was enough. Death was sudden and gruesome.

No, no, no. I’m not talking about the liberal elites hunting down their “deplorable” quarry in The Hunt . I’m talking about how people responded to rumors of the actual movie last September.

The Hunt was originally supposed to be released on Sept. 27, 2019. Two key factors “killed” the film, at least temporarily. First were two horrific mass shootings in early August (in Dayton, Ohio, and in El Paso, Texas, respectively). The second was the shellacking the film received from some prominent conservatives, including some tweets from a fairly famous Twitter user. Some assumed that The Hunt was a shocking, liberal elite revenge fantasy.

Few had seen the film at that point, of course. Many who had seen it suggested that the satirical horror film was actually taking on those liberal elites more than anybody. No matter, though: Some suggested the backlash was just too great for The Hunt to survive.  “I believe this movie will never be released,” Republican strategist John Brabender told ITK .

But anyone familiar with Hollywood horror stories knows that no antagonist is ever truly dead. And so The Hunt shambled out of its open grave and is now in theaters.

So now that we’ve seen it, what’s the movie actually about? Well, technically, it’s … um, about liberal elites hunting down Jesus-loving, gun-toting MAGA-hat-wearing conservatives. But this satire’s own quarry isn’t so easy to pin down. It seems that in this hunt, it’s open season on everyone.

Positive Elements

We see a few of the hunted try to save each other with mostly dispiriting results.

Spiritual Elements

As one of the hunted cowers before his would-be killers, he tells one of them that they should “go to h—.” The hunter tells him that he doesn’t believe in such a place—being a part, he says snidely, of the “godless elite.” That scene is one of a handful of disparaging comments we hear uttered about faith and religion, especially Christianity, by the hunters.

Crystal and Gary, two of the hunted, hop on a train and discover the box car hides a family of apparent Islamic refugees. Gary believes the family are actors (including the baby one carries), and he snidely calls one of them “Muhammed.” When Crystal and Don (another hunted couple) pop a trunk and find a body, inside, Don misuses Jesus’ name in shock and dismay. “Nope,” Crystal says. “It’s this guy.”

Sexual Content

Hunters discuss how one of them visited Haiti on a supposed humanitarian mission and got a woman pregnant there. “I hope she was pro-choice,” another hunter quips. We hear more cynicism about the man’s Haiti trip and some more jokes about his, ahem, extracurricular activities there.

Crystal’s top reveals a bit of her torso. An online video has some imagined sexual subtext to it.

Violent Content

Before moviegoers have even warmed up their theater seats, someone gets stabbed in the neck with a pen (blood spurts out of the severed artery) and has his eye gouged out with a stiletto heel. (We see the orbital organ, including the grotesque optic nerve, hanging from the shoe.) And really, it just goes downhill from there.

Someone falls into a pit filled with spikes and is impaled. Two people die via landmine: One essentially evaporates, while the other—or, at least, part of the other—gets hurled 20 or 30 feet away. Someone finds the victim, still living, with just the top half intact; entrails and organs hang out of her torso and waist. She still has the wherewithal to grab a gun and finish herself off, though. Two people are stabbed in the gut with a Cuisinart blade. A man has half of his head disgustingly blown off. (He’s just one of several people who die—often bloodily and gorily—via bullets or shotgun shells.)

Someone is killed after having his throat cut: Blood, of course, sprays cinematically. Another victim is shot with several arrows. (He runs with the weapons still sticking in various parts of his body, though the arrow that pierces his neck finally brings him down.) Someone’s skewered through the middle, but then survives long enough to be shot in the head. At least two people get blown to bits by grenades (though one such death, miraculously, takes place off-camera). Someone’s head is run over by a car. A victim is poisoned via powdered donut. Someone’s body is discovered with a knife sticking out of his forehead. A guy is shot, then battered with a pipe, then shot again. A man dies from some sort of gas. A champagne bottle is broken and used as a weapon.

We see some pretty frenetic fighting, with folks getting punched and kicked and hit in the privates. Someone’s stabbed in the shoulder with what might be a cooking thermometer. Trucks are wired to blow up. Blood spills, sprays and is sometimes literally mopped up. An innocent, surprisingly well-dressed pig gets gunned down.

We read a violent text message string referencing the Manor, where “deplorables” are hunted. We hear a really violent children’s story—a variation on the tortoise and the hare. A bullet hole in someone’s shoulder is painfully prodded.

Crude or Profane Language

We hear nearly 90 f-words (including several using the word “mother”) and about 15 s-words. We also hear “a–,” “b–ch,” “d–n”, “h—” and “p-ss”. God’s name is misused about 10 times (at least three of those with the word “d–n”), while Jesus’ name is abused another 10 times or so (often paired with the f-word). There’s a reference to the “n-word,” though that slur is not actually spoken. We see a middle finger flashed in a picture.

Drug and Alcohol Content

Someone discusses dealing with their problems through drinking and drugs. A rich guy in an airplane demands some champagne and discusses, at some length, a trio of $250,000 bottles of the bubbly. Someone rescues a bottle of very old champagne from certain destruction.

We hear that someone’s father was a methamphetamine dealer and addict, and that her mother died from a drug overdose. Someone guzzles champagne from the bottle. A couple of people smoke, and one discovers a ruse because she knows the price of cigarettes in Arkansas.

Other Negative Elements

The hunters of The Hunt come across as pampered, inconsiderate jerks. For instance, one taunts the flight attendant serving him—asking her whether she’s ever had caviar (she hasn’t), then asking her to take his away because he just had some “last night.” We hear some debate about whether calling someone “black” is racist (National Public Radio says it’s OK, one says; but NPR is staffed primarily by white people, another counters), or whether wearing a kimono is cultural appropriation. We hear references to several political issues and some hostile (and sometimes profane) references to a certain resident of the White House.

Some of the hunted, though, are painted a bit like the hunters would paint them. Several spout conspiracy theories: One claims to be an expert because he exposes “truth” through his podcast (one with the word “Confederate” in its title) and comes across as fairly racist. Several people are accused of spreading misinformation online.

A woman drops her drawers and urinates by a set of train tracks. A man urinates by a tree.

Satire is hard to pull off in this touchy age of ours. We live in an era of Twitter rage and trigger warnings—some of which may be warranted, perhaps. But it can still have a chilling impact on public discourse and debate. In our society’s laudable desire to call out wrongdoing, some would say we’re tickling an Orwellian-like impulse for “right thinking,” a homogeny of acceptable expression that, ironically, involves very little thinking at all.

The Hunt leans hard into those Orwellian themes, complete with shirt-wearing pigs (a reference to George Orwell’s Animal Farm ). That gives The Hunt a more rightward tilt: The conservative “hunted” suffer their share of abuse in the movie, but it’s the progressive hunters who are most relentlessly (if not always effectively) mocked.

But ultimately, the movie’s not aiming at them, either. The ultimate quarry here seems to is society itself.

The problem isn’t that conservatives are “deplorable” or liberals are laughable: It’s that society as a whole can’t stop divvying them up as such. We (using the term loosely and broadly) look at someone, check a series of boxes based on how they look and talk and dress and vote and assume that we know them. The fact that so many people in this movie aren’t exactly who they seem appears itself to be a meta-statement about our culture today.

Those of us who call ourselves evangelical Christians understand how “judgey” the culture can be: We’ve been judged plenty. But let’s face it: We can easily judge those who don’t share our convictions just as quickly, and just as harshly.

Of course, there’s another irony lurking here: As a movie critic, it’s actually my job to be judgmental. But because I’ve spent plenty of time with this particular movie—I sat through the whole thing, in fact—I feel that I’m not rushing to judgment.

Whatever point The Hunt may want to make, or whatever value it might hope to have, is pretty much obliterated by its violence, just like so many of its characters. The blood and gore here are meant to be shocking and, at times, even funny—but instead they’re just gross. And that’s a strange and undercutting dichotomy in a film that encourages us to treat one another as people, and then treat its own people like so much meat.

Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.

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Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Hunt’ on Peacock, a Violent Mess of a Free-For-All Political Satire

Where to Stream:

• The Hunt (2020)

The Hunt debuted roughly one million years ago, March 13, 2020, just before pandemic shutdowns began, and now it’s fresh on Peacock , for anyone with carbon-dating technology to watch. A political satire rife with supergross violence, the movie was a pre-COVID controversy, scuttled from its 2019 release date by mass shootings and Trump-inspired criticism for its shit-stirring plot about rich libs sport-hunting redneck righties, prompting the marketing department to devise a reactionary tagline: “The most talked about movie of the year is one that no one’s actually seen.” They had a point, and by “they” we mean prolific genre-flick production house Blumhouse, director Craig Zobel (who just helmed all episodes of Mare of Eastown ) and writers Damon Lindelof ( Lost and Watchmen firebrand) and Nick Cuse. Well, now we have a chance to see it with the benefit of hindsight, which will help us determine if pre-COVID, pre-racial-reckoning, pre-2020-election, pre-Jan. 6-resurrection politics seem laughably quaint, hauntingly prescient or some combination thereof.

THE HUNT : STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: A pretentious jerk condescends to a stewardess on a private jet. Something about caviar and champagne. Suddenly, a man wearing a lot of rugged denim stumbles drooling into the passenger cabin, and the pretentious jerk puts a hole in his jugular with an ink pen. Against the odds, such a maneuver doesn’t kill him, so a woman whose face we don’t see Single White Female s Denim Guy, then calmly plucks his eyeball from the spike. The scene is played for laughs and shock value, and I’m not sure if I didn’t laugh because it seems like I’ve seen this type of winking and snarky bloodshed before many times or because I’m too much of a boring and responsible adult to be amused by it. But it’s definitely played for laughs.

CUT TO: The woods somewhere. A blonde woman played by Emma Roberts, and dubbed “Yoga Pants” in the credits, awakens, gagged and disoriented. She looks over yonder and spies another gagged woman (Betty Gilpin), and follows her to an open field where other gagged folks make their way to a big crate. It contains a clothed pig, which may be a symbol or a metaphor or something, a bunch of guns and machetes and other weapons, and the key to the padlocks on their gags. Suddenly, a shot rings out, and Emma Roberts’ head explodes, presumably totally ruining her yoga pants. A lady tries to book it outta there but falls in a pit full of spikes and is impaled; a guy rescues her but as they make their way up a path he steps on a landmine and little bits of them go flying in all directions, north and south, and right and left, no doubt.

It soon becomes apparent that these people are gun nuts, shitposters, conspiracy theorists and other such righties. It also becomes apparent that Gilpin Lady is a highly trained, half-Wick Afghanistan vet, and possibly a sociopath, because she can think AND kill her way out of precarious situations. She sort of but not really befriends a doof named Gary (Ethan Suplee) who likes to tell everyone he has a podcast on which he’s been exposing the truth about liberal elites who hunt conservatives for sport, which sure seems to be happening right now. She also sort of but not really allies with a ballcapped Hannity fan named Don (Wayne Duvall), and runs across a tracksuited character dubbed “Vanilla Nice” in the credits, played by Sturgill Simpson with a Florida state tat on his face. Will they get to the bottom of this. Who will survive. What is the truth. Who is right and who is wrong. Wait, isn’t Hilary Swank in this. Yes she is. But saying more would be a SPOILER, and I ain’t in that business, baby.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: The Hunt is The Most Dangerous Game meets The Purge , smeared with a thick layer of South Park -style all-directions satirical anarchy.

Performance Worth Watching: Gilpin’s character is the only one here with anything resembling a point-of-view. She manages to be winking and earnest — and even if you hate the movie, you might love her wily, smart performance.

Memorable Dialogue: “It’s my birthday tomorrow. I’m gonna eat a whole pie!” — what a woman with a spike through her midsection blurts out, perhaps not realizing they may be her last words

Sex and Skin: None: TBATEIAIAATF: Too Busy Asserting That Everyone In America Is An Asshole To F—.

Our Take: I’m tempted to call The Hunt a nostalgia exercise here in 2021, where the movie exists to remind us of an America that was slightly less hopelessly deeply and painfully culturally divided. The filmmakers oscillate between asympathetic points-of-view before settling into Gilpin’s character just enough to perk our interest in something beyond easy jabs at lefties (NPR and Ava DuVernay-liked-my-tweet jokes) and easy jabs at righties (“I have a podcast!”, “I have seven guns!”) and easy jabs at social media and easy jabs at The Media, all couched in the type of OTT extreme gore that tells us not to take any of this seriously, and then here, take this elbow in the ribs and then take an aspirin for the headache you’ll get when you fruitlessly attempt to ascertain anything resembling thematic coherence from the text.

You might skewer the film on a false-equivalence pike, and you might have a point, but isn’t that just something some annoying liberal might say? Doesn’t matter if that’s a valid point, because EVERYTHING deserves to be ridiculed! Who cares about anything — let’s just sit back and laugh as one character says, “You don’t really care about the truth, do you?” and another character replies, “Of course I do. The only difference is, I’m right.” And then the two characters fight each other in an isn’t-that-person-losing-a-lot-of-blood-from-that-perforated-bowel sequence that’s so impressively directed and choreographed, we almost forget that the movie is really doesn’t have anything interesting to say or do beyond the exploitation of political division for cheap, albeit rousing thrills.

The script is just LOADED with hot-button phraseology — “crisis actors,” “cultural appropriation,” “snowflakes,” “cucks,” etc., but not “cancel culture,” because that didn’t really catch fire until several months after the movie was released — cribbed from the most annoying social media posts ever. The film is a series of reactions, overreactions and overreactions to overreactions, and never rises above the milieu, as if not a single component of American culture is worth salvaging. It ultimately drags down Gilpin, whose character is a mess, strangely sympathetic while also irredeemable; someone give her a better vehicle, and while you’re at it, give Zobel an action film worthy of his clever, assured direction. The Hunt is entertaining but despairing, and also a quickly dated mess, prompting one to yearn for something more subtle, like Borat or a punch in the nose.

Our Call: SKIP IT. Hey everyone, The Hunt wants us to know that everything sucks and isn’t worth it!

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com or follow him on Twitter: @johnserba .

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Bad Boys 4 Reviews & Rotten Tomatoes Score Promise One of the Best Movies in the Action Franchise

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• Critics praise Bad Boys: Ride or Die as one of the best in the franchise, with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 68%.
• Will Smith and Martin Lawrence shine in the movie, keeping their chemistry sharp and entertaining.
• While some faults were found, the movie delivers on over-the-top action and genuine wit, showing the Bad Boys can still deliver.

The reviews for Bad Boys: Ride or Die are now in, as the Rotten Tomatoes score, with the action sequel standing as one of the best installments in the franchise . The fourth latest Bad Boys outing now stands at 68% on the review aggregator site , making it the second highest in the series, just behind Bad Boys for Life’s 76% rating. “Will Smith and Martin Lawrence remain good company even when Bad Boys strains to up the ante, proving there's still life left in this high-octane franchise,” the ‘Critics Consensus’ reads. So, what do critics make of the latest adventure of wisecracking Miami cops Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett.

Staring with MovieWeb’s own Julian Roman , there is a lot to enjoy in Bad Boys: Ride or Die , with Julian praising the return of Will Smith and Martin Lawrence.

“Will Smith and Martin Lawrence continue to reign as kings of the buddy cop genre in another action-packed, laugh-out-loud installment of the Bad Boys franchise. Their fourth film together feels like seeing cherished friends who haven't lost a step after nearly three decades. Bad Boys: Ride or Die slickly incorporates old and new characters into a reversal of fortune for our badass heroes.”

Bad Boys: Ride or Die’s Will Smith Says 'It's Nothing But Love' from Fans

Smith is grateful to the supportive fans who showed up at the Bad Boys: Ride or Die premiere, despite the 2022 Oscars' slap snafu.

There is further praise for the main duo courtesy of Screen Rant’s Mae Abdulbaki , who says their captivating chemistry is the best thing in the movie.

“Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are just as sharp as ever in Bad Boys: Ride or Die, and their onscreen chemistry continues to hold the film together.”

While Collider’s Matt Donato found a few faults with Bad Boys: Ride or Die , he did conclude that, when the movie works, it really works, and reminds us why we love going to the cinema .

“What works reminds us why we love going to the movies, and what doesn’t shuffles out of frame before too much damage is done.”

Bad Boys: Ride or Die Lands in Theaters on Friday

Bad boys: ride or die.

Bad Boys: Ride or Die is the fourth installment in the action-comedy film series starring Will Smith and Martin Lawrence. The series centers on hard-boiled Miami detectives Mike Lowery and Marcus Burnett, who take on dangerous drug kingpins and thwart dangerous schemes as they attempt to stop the circulation of illicit drugs in their city. This time, Miami's finest are the ones on the run.

Variety’s Owen Gleiberman , meanwhile, calls the Bad Boys effort “movie junk food” and loved the comforting nature of the action movie .

“We like our movie junk food amped and familiar. In that light, what could be more comforting than watching the two stars of “Ride or Die” trash-talk each other with the kind of deep-dish disgruntled conviction it takes 29 years to build up?”

Similarly, IGN’s Eric Goldman reveled in the over-the-top action , heaping praise on the “panache” shown by directing duo Adil & Bilall.

“Yes, it’s as over the top and silly as ever, but it’s done with more panache and genuine wit than before, proving these Bad Boys, even at their older age, can still deliver.”

Directed by Adil & Bilall and written by Chris Bremner, Bad Boys: Ride or Die sees Will Smith return as Detective Lieutenant Michael Eugene "Mike" Lowrey alongside Martin Lawrence as Detective Lieutenant Marcus Miles Burnett. The rest of the cast includes Vanessa Hudgens, Alexander Ludwig, Paola Núñez, Tasha Smith, John Salley, Eric Dane, DJ Khaled, Ioan Gruffudd, with Jacob Scipio as Armando Aretas, Mike and Isabel's son, and Joe Pantoliano as Captain Conrad Howard.

You can check out the official synopsis and the trailer for Bad Boys: Ride or Die below.

“This Summer, the world's favorite Bad Boys are back with their iconic mix of edge-of-your seat action and outrageous comedy but this time with a twist: Miami's finest are now on the run.”

Bad Boys: Ride or Die is scheduled to hit theaters in the United States on June 7, 2024.

The Hunt says it’s cleverly skewering everyone. Don’t fall for it.

The self-styled provocative bloodbath is a masterclass in botched satire.

by Alissa Wilkinson

The Hunt was controversial before it was released — before, in fact, its release was delayed — and its marketing has aggressively played up the controversy , proclaiming that with this movie, “everyone is fair game.” It’s a movie about rich liberals who hunt working-class conservatives for sport, kind of. It’s about red versus blue, left versus right, elite versus salt of the earth. In this world, there are two kinds of people: rich snooty hypocritical globalist snowflakes who live in fancy houses; and gun-obsessed, racist hicks from places ranging from Staten Island to Georgia.

And here’s the big twist: Everybody takes a drubbing! Everyone gets made fun of! It’s hilarious; it’s provocative; it’s satirical!

Let me be blunt: If The Hunt is what passes for satire in 2020, as I think it may, then we’re all — pardon my French — completely screwed. It’s a movie that fundamentally misunderstands what satire can do, the function it fills, and the way it works; it’s the cinematic equivalent of the guy on Twitter that makes an unnecessarily rancid joke, and then when people get upset at him, angrily tweets about how nobody understands satire.

Naw, man, it’s not satire. It’s just senseless.

What is satire? It’s humorous or ironic. It exaggerates and ridicules. It seeks to expose the follies of a group or of society at large, usually political. And, most importantly, it has a goal: to shame people into change, or action.

Perhaps the most famous satirical work of all time is Jonathan Swift’s 1729 essay “ A Modest Proposal ” (full title: “A Modest Proposal for preventing the children of poor people in Ireland, from being a burden on their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the publick”), which proposed that poor Irish people should sell their children to the rich as food in order to ease their money problems.

Swift, obviously (I hope), wasn’t actually proposing this. Instead, he was essentially writing in the voice of those who held cruel attitudes toward the poor, while also mocking inhumane British policies toward the Irish. The premise was that those who read it would recognize fragments of those views and understand, by way of Swift’s hyperbole, how ridiculous and cruel the ideas were. “A Modest Proposal” lays a template for modern satire, a rhetorical device designed not just to repeat the exaggerations of the ideas people mindlessly spew, but also show why they’re ridiculous.

And that is precisely why The Hunt fails. Rather than exaggerate the ideas it aims to skewer, it just repeats them doggedly, like a parrot without comprehension. Rather than dig at a particular behavior or mindset causing our national division, The Hunt acts like the symptoms are the problem — as if the slogans and bywords and hot-button phrases we slog through in the media are what deserve ridicule, in equal measure. It verges, if not plunges, straight into nihilism. What a waste.

The Hunt is empty, shallow, and devoid of anything approaching actual satire

I’d feel bad about spoiling the “twist” of The Hunt , except it’s barely a twist. So if you’re hell-bent on seeing the movie and don’t want to be spoiled, avert your eyes. Otherwise, read on.

In essence, here’s the plot, which reveals itself in pieces: Some fevered corner of the right-wing internet has concocted the notion that rich liberals, the kind who work in glassy offices and own vacation homes, round up a bunch of “deplorables” every year and hunt them for sport. This is silly (if only because the stereotypical liberal isn’t into guns), but it’s so silly that those selfsame liberals make jokes about going hunting in a group text to one another, which then gets exposed to national media somehow, which then reinforces the idea that this is actually happening. And so, those liberals decide, as long as people think they hunt deplorables for sport, they might as well actually do it. Right?

I mean, no. But this movie doesn’t believe anyone subscribes to concepts like “decency” and “human dignity” and “the milk of human kindness.” The closest thing to a hero in The Hunt is Crystal (an admittedly terrific Betty Gilpin, who is solely responsible for this film receiving any stars at all), a vet who wakes up in a field somewhere in the middle of nowhere with 11 strangers after being kidnapped and drugged, and has to find her way out while being hunted by snipers. She is, as you might have guessed, more than up to the task — even when she fights her way toward a confrontation with sleek, smug, liberal mastermind Athena (Hilary Swank).

Everyone else in the movie is lousy, though — dismissive, angry, violent, ready to murder at a moment’s notice. You could argue this is the movie’s way of satirizing “cancel culture” by exaggerating it a little (those who compare “cancelation” to actual murder might even dispute the idea that it’s exaggerated). But the movie isn’t satirical at all. It isn’t aiming to expose silliness in order to shame people into changing their mindsets. It’s not deftly pointing out the attitudes that lead to rancid divisions, or exposing the dangers of easy generalizations and swift judgments; instead, the movie just leans into those judgments and generalizations, over and over again.

There is the kernel of something interesting lodged in The Hunt that could have been explored — the idea that, by claiming something is true, fringe media might coax that thing into being, thereby both putting itself in jeopardy and also granting itself the joy of confirming its own suspicions. There’d be something intriguing about a satirical movie that shows how there’s a danger to the echo chambers we leave ourselves in, no matter your political persuasion. I’d have loved to see that movie.

But this potentially interesting idea handled so badly in The Hunt that it’s hard to grant the movie any serious consideration. It’s a sledgehammer of a film without a single original thought. It tries very hard to skewer everyone. Not offend them, in the way something like South Park might have; just repeat a lot of slogans you can easily read on the Internet.

The Hunt ’s (delayed) release, as its luck would have it, comes squarely in the middle of a pandemic that’s shutting down cultural institutions and coaxing people to stay away from crowded places, like movie theaters. So it’s possible that the movie won’t be more than a blip on the broader conversation. And thus its inanity will, in all likelihood, be contained.

But since it’s touting itself as “the most controversial film of the year,” in which “no side is spared,” a “no-holds-barred takedown of red and blue states alike,” it’s fair game whether or not anyone sees it. No side is spared and no holds are barred because no shots are fired in The Hunt . It’s empty, juvenile, and pointless. Satire can be done well at the movies; The Hunt is so pleased with its offensiveness that, like the worst self-proclaimed provocateurs, it just falls flat on its face.

The Hunt opens in theaters on March 13. On March 20, it became available on a wide variety of on-demand services, including iTunes, Google Play, Amazon Prime and FandangoNow.

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Review by Brian Eggert March 13, 2020

Some talented people have assembled for the new exploitation movie, The Hunt . Co-writers Nick Cuse and Damon Lindelof, who worked together on HBO’s superb The Leftovers , join a frequent director of that show, Craig Zobel ( Compliance , Z for Zachariah ), for a story designed to prompt outrage on either side of America’s polarized political arena. A satirical work meant to condemn extreme division (the script’s original title was Red State Vs. Blue State ), the story borrows a page from Richard Connell’s 1924 short story “ The Most Dangerous Game ” and features humans stalking and killing other humans. Audiences have seen this sort of thing before in Hard Target (1993) and Surviving the Game (1994)—two thrillers where the super-rich hunt the homeless for sport—but never driven by such obvious political commentary. It’s a bloody story about left-wing elitists who kidnap a dozen right-wing “deplorables” and proceed to dispose of them with bullets, arrows, landmines, and even nastier tricks. But the intended allegory about the dangers of radical partisanship falls flat, and the script’s many references to George Orwell’s Animal Farm want to be smarter than they are.

Debuting on a Friday the 13th about six months after it was supposed to open in theaters, The Hunt was delayed after the media and President Trump prompted Universal’s pre-release jitters. The mass shootings in Dayton and El Paso raised many questions about the timing of the movie’s original release date of September 27, 2019. But it took Trump’s uninformed tweets to convince the studio to postpone the release indefinitely, despite the fact that the few who were voicing their concerns hadn’t seen the movie. Universal and Blumhouse Productions delayed it, inciting mild uproar among those averse to censorship for any reason. Most exploitation movies would wear such attention as a badge of honor, and sure enough, The Hunt ’s new poster features quotes from critics decrying the movie’s subject matter and proclaiming, “The most talked about movie of the year is one that no one’s actually seen.” But the movie doesn’t have anything to brag about; it’s not particularly controversial or transgressive. Had it been released as originally planned, talk about it would have fizzled out by the following Monday. Instead, the last six months have built up impossible expectations for an experience that proves dismissable. 

In the movie’s two prologues, we see a text exchange that ends with the line, “Nothing like going out to the Manor and slaughtering a dozen deplorables”—a descriptor borrowed from Hilary Clinton’s speech about the Trump base as a “basket of deplorables” who are “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic—you name it.” A few moments later, we have been dropped into a woodland setting with a group of gagged and confused right-wingers. Although the script offers scant details about these characters, their faces are familiar enough: Emma Roberts, Ike Barinholtz, Ethan Suplee, and Wayne Duvall among others. They all stumble in the same direction, toward a Hunger Games -style box of weapons, where they arm themselves and ask surprisingly few questions about where they are or why. One of them puts forth a theory: It’s “Manorgate,” a conspiracy that one-percenter democrats are hunting republicans for fun. All at once, the group is attacked from afar by a relentless barrage. Heads explode and body parts fly everywhere in a gory display. The over-the-top violence is played less for horror than a cheeky comic punchline, as indicated by Nathan Barr’s goofy score. 

The Hunt offers two or three sequences that genuinely impress but too few surprises to extend its novelty for the entire 89-minute runtime. I liked the shocking set-piece inside an Arkansas gas station, where the sweet Mom-and-Pop owners (Amy Madigan, Reid Birney) have spun an elaborate spider’s web. I also enjoyed when Crystal starts to fight back against the hunters, especially a sequence where she single-handedly takes on a group holed-up inside a bunker. The finale, where Crystal makes her way to the hunt’s mastermind (Hilary Swank), results in a doozy-of-a-fight—a ruthless hand-to-hand bout where every household object within reach becomes a deadly weapon and no glass door is safe. Zobel and cinematographer Darran Tiernan demonstrate that they’re capable of shooting cohesive action scenes, cut by editor Jane Rizzo as efficiently as Crystal slices through her would-be predators. There’s a shock element at work here too, where the viewer discovers that not all is what it appears; however, the screenplay has only so many twists in store, and none of them are mind-blowing thanks to the spoilery trailers.  

Without resorting to a preachy commentary about the need for political temperance (lest we all destroy each other), The Hunt situates itself firmly within the traditions of the exploitative B-movie—a subgenre that uses gleeful violence to poke and prod to earn a reaction, press coverage, and profit on a modest budget. Even so, Cuse and Lindelof dance around the issues to such an extent that some viewers may miss the point. For instance, the curious, mostly unexplained backstory of the movie’s protagonist, Crystal, could have shed some light on the hero’s perspective had it been clarified—as someone who falls in the middle, politically, and therefore sees these events for their insanity. Instead, The Hunt prefers simple labels and broad violence to make its point, which is not an inherently flawed approach—the aforementioned Hunger Games series did that well. However, the attempt here leaves the viewer wishing the material took greater risks and tried to challenge its audience with its overly familiar Orwellian parable.   

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In the last few years, as streaming services (and their budgets) have grown, it feels as if the true crime genre has seen a reinvention. Gone are the days of dry documentaries, often giving way to fictionalized tales of some of the most famous crimes, deaths and conspiracies in history. Based on James L. Swanson 's book Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer , Apple TV's "Manhunt" follows both Edwin Stanton and John Wilkes Booth after Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. The trailer promised not only a rapid chase, but the unfolding of the conspiracy that aided in Lincoln's death, set to the background of tense music. It’s clear though, as the series unfolds, that the trailer and the actual show at hand could not be more different. 

From the first episode of “Manhunt” it’s apparent that there’s a spark missing. Characters drone on, the lighting is quite bleak and it's not until the actual assassination that the promise of a “conspiracy thriller” feels real. Our gaze lays on Abraham Lincoln ( Hamish Linklater ) and his wife Mary Todd Lincoln ( Lili Taylor ) at the political satire Our American Cousin . Slowly, the curtains of the theater box pull back, and John Wilkes Booth ( Anthony Boyle ) is revealed behind him, cloaked in darkness like Billy from “ Black Christmas .” It’s a staggering shot, and what follows after Lincoln is initially shot is a cacophony of limbs wrestling, noise and a tense score. It’s a welcomed switch from the languid pace this episode takes, but it is also unfortunately unlike anything else in the series.

There’s a foreboding dread that continues on into the series’ second episode, but, by its third, this dread has quickly diminished. It’s a shame too, as the first two episodes directed by Carl Franklin are quite intriguing. For a story like this, there needs to be stakes, otherwise it feels like we’re watching a history book in motion. “Manhunt” would have benefited from being set during the weeks leading up to Lincoln’s assassination, with the back half of the episodes showcasing Stanton’s hunt for his killer. Instead, the assassination takes place in the first episode, and all scenes leading up to it exist in fragmented flashbacks. It’s a shame, because these scenes lay an important foundation to Lincoln’s death, and their existence almost feels like an afterthought. In turn, the chase to find Booth doesn't happen quick enough. What could have been an engaging thriller feels like a drama trying to reel viewers in by the promise of this chase, when in reality it doesn’t happen until the series is almost over.

On a performance level,  Tobias Menzies is quite good as Edwin Stanton, and his scenes with Hamish Linklater as Abraham Lincoln are one of the only things tethering the show to greatness as it treks along. Watching them makes it feel like maybe you’re watching something worthwhile, but again, when they aren’t on screen it's impossible to not feel like Linklater especially is wasted on a role that after the first episode is relegated to flashbacks. 

One of the show's highlights is the inclusion of Mary Simms ( Lovie Simone ), a Black woman trying to gain her freedom amidst Lincoln’s death and the impending revival of the Confederate cause. Simone is ecstatic to watch–whenever she gets screen time that is–and it's impossible not to miss her when she isn’t on screen. She plays Mary with a resolve and passion that feels unlike any other performance in the show, harnessing her character's stifled anger with a reverence some of her castmates seem incapable of. It’s performances like Simone’s and Menzies' that really make you wonder why their talents are being wasted on a show so incredibly dull. 

History buffs are the ones most likely to be intrigued by “Manhunt.” On a craft level, the show is embedded with a sense of history, from the costumes to the sets, making it one of the best-crafted shows of the year. It’s something Apple TV+ has on its peers; they don’t stray away from shelling out funds to shows they deem important. But there comes the question of whether a show like this is going to be able to stand out amongst an already busy first quarter of television if the writing doesn't connect with viewers. 

With seven episodes and too little narrative, it feels as if the writers are dragging a shorter project out, and a languid pace just doesn't work for a story that only took place over the course of twelve days. To keep regular viewers engaged, something that is billed as a conspiracy thriller needs to have stakes of some kind. While “Manhunt” is based on a true–and historically famous-story, what it reveals is that this story just isn’t all that interesting. What comes of it is instead proof that sometimes on-screen adaptations of non-fiction works just don’t need to be made. 

Whole series screened for review. Premieres on March 15th.

Kaiya Shunyata

Kaiya Shunyata is a freelance pop culture writer and academic based in Canada. They have written for RogerEbert.com, Xtra, Okayplayer, The Daily Beast, AltPress and more. 

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What Happened To Themistocles In 300: Rise Of An Empire

300: rise of an empire cast & returning character guide, 300: rise of an empire's timeline & how it fits into the original movie's events explained.

• 300: Rise of an Empire acts as both prequel and sequel to 300, exploring another battle during the same time period as Thermopylae.
• The film received mixed reviews, with a 45% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes. Some praised the action and Eva Green's performance.
• While not as critically acclaimed as the original, fans of 300 and historical action epics may still find 300: Rise of an Empire enjoyable.

300: Rise of an Empire is the little-known sequel to Zack Snyder's smash hit 300 , and many fans of the original film are wondering if they should check out the 2014 follow-up. The film acts as a prequel and a sequel to the timeline of 300 , with it expanding on the events of the film by showing another battle that was taking place at around the same time as Leonidas' battle at Thermopylae. While 300 is still incredibly popular, 300: Rise of an Empire isn't as well known, with tons of viewers of the original film not having checked it out yet.

Zack Snyder's 300 is one of the director's biggest hits, with the film telling the story of the Battle of Thermopylae, in which King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans fought the much bigger Persian army. 300 is based on a comic series of the same name , and the film adaptation was a huge success, with it making $456 million on a $60 million budget and receiving positive critical reviews. Because of the success of 300 , a sequel attempted to capitalize on the original film, with 300: Rise of an Empire following in the original movie's footsteps.

The ancient Greek soldier Themistocles was depicted in the 2014 film 300: Rise of an Empire, but some liberties were taken with history in the movie.

300: Rise Of An Empire Has A 45% Score From Critics On Rotten Tomatoes

The movie's rotten tomatoes audience score is 51%.

300: Rise of an Empire didn't perform as well critically as its 2006 predecessor, with the film having a 45% score from critics on Rotten Tomatoes as of the writing of this article. This reflects the mixed and negative reviews that the sequel received upon its release, with 300: Rise of an Empire not impressing many critics. The film didn't do well with general audiences either, as 300: Rise of an Empire only has a 51% audience score, meaning that everyday viewers only liked it slightly more on average than the critics.

Although 300: Rise of an Empire has a worse Rotten Tomatoes score than 300 , it isn't by too much. The first 300 movie only has a 61% critics score, meaning that, while on average critics liked 300 more, it wasn't by much. The bigger difference comes when looking at the audience score, as 300 has an 89%, which is much higher than 300: Rise of an Empire 's 51% (via Rotten Tomatoes ). So, while critics tend to be bigger fans of the first 300 , the same is even more true for general audiences.

300: Rise Of An Empire's Reviews Praise Its Action Gore & Eva Green's Performance But Compare It Unfavorably To 300

It didn't live up to snyder's original.

The Rotten Tomatoes score of 300: Rise of an Empire reflects the mixed reviews that the film has gotten, as some parts were well-liked by viewers, but other parts were not. The biggest positives of the film have to do with the action , as the reviews tend to praise the fight scenes and gore, something that 300 got right. Eva Green's performance as the Greek queen Artemisia has also been acclaimed, with it being one of the best aspects of the film.

However, even these parts of 300: Rise of an Empire aren't as good as similar parts in 300 . While the action is good, it is hard to compare to Zack Snyder's legendary 300 action scenes, parts of which went on to define the director's style. On top of that, nearly every performance in 300 is legendary, and that is mostly due to the film's writing. 300 is full of famous quotes that have become iconic since the film was first released in 2006, with this having a hand in elevating each character and actor.

300: Rise of An Empire is a sequel to the historical epic action film 300, and features a number of overlapping characters with the original film.

300: Rise Of An Empire Is Worth Watching For Fans Of 300 & Historical Action Epics

Fans of the original will enjoy the sequel.

While the reviews for 300: Rise of an Empire are mixed, it is worth watching for some. Fans of the original 300 will be able to get a lot out of 300 Rise of an Empire , as it explores the world further and brings back the signature style and tone of the Zack Snyder movie and the original comics.

On top of that, fans of historical action epics in general will enjoy 300: Rise of an Empire , as it features many of the genre's staples. Not only does 300: Rise of an Empire explore the true story of the battles it portrays, but it also adds in some elements in order to make it seem more epic, similar to the original 300 . So, while the film may not be a hit with everyone, there are definitely fans out there who will love 300: Rise of an Empire .

Source: Rotten Tomatoes

300: Rise of an Empire

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Based on Frank Miller's latest graphic novel, "Xerxes," 300: Rise of an Empire follows greek general Themistokles' attempts to unite all of Greece by leading the charge that will change the course of the war. The movie pits Themistokles against the massive invading Persian forces led by mortal-turned-god Xerxes and the deadly Artemisia, the vengeful commander of the Persian navy.

Bad Boys 4 Rotten Tomatoes Score Continues Franchise's Positive Streak

• The early Rotten Tomatoes score for Bad Boys: Ride or Die is 70%, falling in line with franchise trends of low critical but high audience ratings.
• The movie, directed by Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, is praised for its chemistry between Smith and Lawrence, over-the-top action, and direction.
• While not an award-winning film, Bad Boys: Ride or Die delivers on the signature dynamic duo and action fans have come to expect.

With its premiere around the corner, the Rotten Tomatoes score for Bad Boys: Ride or Die has been revealed. The franchise, starring Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, first debuted in 1995. While it received mediocre reviews, it was enough of a hit to warrant a sequel, Bad Boys 2 , which came out in 2003. The third film, Bad Boys for Life , came out 2020 and left the window open for sequels. The fourth Bad Boys film will follow Smith’s Mike Lowrey and Lawrence’s Marcus Burnett as they try to clear their names and the name of their late captain amid an apparent conspiracy.

With its first wave of reviews in, the Rotten Tomatoes score for Bad Boys: Ride or Die has been unveiled. At the time of this writing, the film has 60 reviews and a 70% RT score from critics . Helmed by Bad Boys for Life directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah , the movie is being celebrated for its direction, chemistry between the two lead stars, and over-the-top action, the two latter features being things fans of the franchise are anticipating. Meanwhile, negative reviews for the movie bash its script and say that the franchise is running on fumes.

Despite Its Negative Reviews, Bad Boys: Ride Or Die Has The Second-Highest Tomatometer Of The Franchise

The movie is off to a good start.

With only 60 reviews up for the film, expect the Tomatometer to fluctuate a few percentages here and there. It should also be noted that it's a franchise trend for the movies to have low reviews from critics, while being a hit with the audience . Bad Boys: Ride or Die might continue this trend, as its first reviews seem to say that the movie delivers on what people have come to expect from the franchise. If it continues to satisfy audience interest, then it won't matter what the ultimate Rotten Tomatoes score is for Ride or Die .

Bad Boys: Ride Or Die Review - Will Smith & Martin Lawrence Have Still Got It

Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are just as sharp as ever in Bad Boys: Ride or Die, and their onscreen chemistry continues to hold the film together.

The first Bad Boys movie was panned by critics but received solid reviews from the audience. The second film earned a similar reception. Bad Boys for Life holds the franchise’s highest Rotten Tomatoes score from critics and the audience. It should also be noted that the franchise continually makes good money . Bad Boys for Life , on top of its solid reviews, made $426 million worldwide ahead of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Check out the table below for a review of the franchise’s Tomatometers:

It’s apparent that Bad Boys: Ride or Die isn’t winning any Oscars, but that isn’t the whole point of the franchise. The series is rather known for its dynamic duo of Smith and Lawrence, and high-octane action. While it may be the kind of action one would have to turn off their brain to enjoy, it does the job by entertaining its viewers nonetheless . With its first wave of reviews out of the way and trending positive, Bad Boys: Ride or Die seems to be another solid installment for the franchise.

Bad Boys, Bad Boys II, and Bad Boys for Life are available to stream on Hulu.

Source: Rotten Tomatoes

Bad Boys: Ride or Die

Director Bilall Fallah, Adil El Arbi

Release Date June 7, 2024

Studio(s) Jerry Bruckheimer Films, Westbrook Studios, Don Simpson Films, 2.0 Entertainment, Columbia Pictures

Distributor(s) Sony Pictures Releasing

Writers Chris Bremner

Cast Paola Nez, Vanessa Hudgens, Eric Dane, Will Smith, Tasha Smith, Martin Lawrence, Ioan Gruffudd, Alexander Ludwig

Genres Comedy, Action, Adventure

Franchise(s) Bad Boys

prequel(s) Bad Boys 2, Bad Boys for Life, Bad Boys (1995)

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The 5 Most Anticipated Movies of June 2024

This month's list includes an animated treat, a horror prequel, an action sequel, and more..

TAGGED AS: movies , Summer

The big movies in May didn’t exactly set the world on fire to kick off the summer movie season, so the hope is that we’ll see an uptick in June. The titles this month include an eclectic mix of franchise installments and critically acclaimed names across a variety of genres, from animation to horror to… whatever it is Yorgos Lanthimos is doing. We asked you to vote for the movie you’re most looking forward to this month, and an unlikely winner emerged, so read on for the most anticipated movies of June 2024!

Release Date: June 14, 2024

Believe it or not, this Pixar sequel finished at the top of our poll by a pretty significant margin. Sure, the first Inside Out is a beloved, Oscar-winning fan favorite, but that’s not a particularly unique designation for a Pixar movie. Still, Amy Poehler looks to lead another strong voice cast, this time joined by Maya Hawke, Ayo Edibiri, Adèle Exarchopoulos, and Paul Walter Hauser voicing new emotions rising up in a now teenaged Riley.

Release Date: June 28, 2024

Coming in behind Inside Out 2 is this prequel to the popular A Quiet Place franchise. Whereas the first two films took place well after the series’ sound-sensitive monsters have already ravaged the planet, this one depicts the early days of the invasion, following a woman named Sam (played by Lupita Nyong’o) who struggles to survive as the creatures land in New York City. Michael Sarnoski makes the leap to blockbuster entertainment after giving us 2021’s Pig , taking over directorial duties from John Krasinski.

Release Date: June 7, 2024

Inside Out 2 and A Quiet Place: Day One dominated the votes this month, but the fourth Bad Boys film managed to top the rest of the bunch, proving that the franchise starring Will Smith and Martin Lawrence has still got some gas in the tank. This time around, Mike and Marcus find themselves on the run after the death of their former captain (Joe Pantoliano) compels them to investigate corruption within the Miami police department.

Release Date: June 21, 2024

Following just behind Bad Boys is the latest collaboration between writer-director Yorgos Lanthimos and Emma Stone, whose last film, Poor Things , earned four Oscars, including Best Actress for Stone’s work.  Kinds of Kindness is arguably more challenging a film than  Poor Things (if you can believe that), as it depicts a trio of loosely connected stories with its cast — which also includes people like Jesse Plemons, Hong Chau, Willem Dafoe, and Margaret Qualley, among others — portraying different characters in each segment.

Premiere Date: June 7, 2024 on Netflix

Lastly, we have this romantic crime comedy from Richard Linklater starring Glen Powell and Adria Arjona. The story, based on a magazine article in Texas Monthly from 2001, centers on a New Orleans police officer who poses as a hitman to arrest those seeking out his services but ends up falling for a woman who attempts to hire him to kill her abusive husband. Netflix debuted the film in theaters in late May, but it hits the streaming service on June 7.

Thumbnail images by ©Disney/Pixar On an Apple device? Follow Rotten Tomatoes on Apple News.

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