Robert Pattinson continues his banner year, following The Odyssey and The Drama, with Primetime. Playing real-life American television presenter Chris Hansen, it’s another out-on-a-limb turn from an actor who specialises in them. Written and directed by Lance Oppenheim, making his feature film debut after working in the documentary field, the story concentrates on Hansen during his tenure at Dateline NBC, when he hosted the regular segment To Catch a Predator.
Arriving in the early 2000s when “television is changing”, we’re told, the core of the show sees Hansen out to ensnare internet paedophiles who are grooming young kids. Alongside Hansen is producer Andie Bender (Merritt Wever), computer specialist Xavier Von Erck (Matthew Maher) and Del (singer Phoebe Bridgers), who poses as both boys and girls when the predators actually pluck up the courage to speak on the phone.
Joining the team is aspiring actor Dan Plumb (Skyler Gisondo, who played Jimmy Olsen in the 2025 Superman film). Desperate to break into the biz, he’s convinced to come on board as the decoy that these deviant men actually meet – before Hansen steps in from the shadows and informs them that they’ve just been busted, in front of the cameras. “You can’t treat it like acting,” he tells the wide-eyed Plumb, who was based on real-life decoy Dan Schrack.
The film starts well enough, with some bizarrely twisted moments, but the issue with Primetime is it never quite knows what it wants to be.
View Green Video on the source websiteIs it a satire on the media? Certainly, it’s all about the ratings for Hansen, who is up against ABC drama-of-the-hour Lost in the schedules. Or is it a film about the morals and ethics of entrapping these predators? “We’re cleansing the world of an ancient evil,” claims Hansen, rather pompously. Or perhaps it’s a character study of Hansen, whose own misdemeanours are put under the microscope when the National Enquirer starts digging?
None of these narratives are particularly well detailed by Oppenheim, who steers the film towards the gang’s pursuit of an anonymous high-profile abuser, nicknamed “the whale”. With the film very operatic in tone, the visuals and sound design can be very overwrought, with thunder crashing and rain pouring as the Captain Ahab-like Hansen promises that Plumb will be a part of television history if they land their whale.
Pattinson, who also produces alongside Midsommar director Ari Aster, is excellent as the oily Hansen, as is Gisondo, who starts out by watching Billy Bob Thornton on Inside the Actors Studio, dreaming of one day getting his big break. But the writing isn’t really there to give any great insight into their characters, beyond only the most superficial level.
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No doubt, the film will get compared to other ‘media’ movies like the Oscar-winning Network and the brilliant photojournalist tale Nightcrawler, with Jake Gyllenhaal, as it aims to examine just how far a hidden camera show like To Catch a Predator should ever be allowed to go.
Sadly, Oppenheim never quite strikes the right balance in the film’s second half, not helped by the fact that Hansen’s own troubles seem to largely disappear from the film. At one point, Hansen meets a fan, who runs a group ‘Perverted Justice’, out to expose “perverts”. You’re left wishing that this had been further explored, rather than solely focusing on Hansen’s own perverted quest for justice.
Primetime is released in UK cinemas on Friday 30 October.
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