Rent Dead Man's Wire (2025)

A Shotgun, a Grudge, and a Very Good Time - Dead Man's Wire review by griggs

I wasn’t expecting Gus Van Sant to make a hostage thriller this fun, but here we are. Dead Man’s Wire follows a man choking on debt who straps a shotgun to his hostage and turns a public breakdown into one last bid for control. It’s blackly funny and properly queasy, sitting somewhere between Dog Day Afternoon and Network. The wintry Indianapolis setting and drab, no-fuss style sell the period without tipping into retro cosplay.

Bill Skarsgård is excellent: bulging eyes, brittle fury, full-body self-pity. Colman Domingo more than holds his own as the cool-headed radio DJ drawn into the circus. Al Pacino turns up in full late-career ham mode and, honestly, fair play to him.

Van Sant handles the shifts between menace, absurdity and satire with a surprisingly light touch. It occasionally spends so long inside this aggrieved male tantrum that it risks getting a bit too sympathetic. Still, it’s bleak, surreal and funny in exactly the wrong way. The use of “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head” near the tipping point is a sly Butch Cassidy callback that makes the bad taste linger. More pointed than just another odd little true-crime yarn.