Primetime Review
Primetime (2026) Film Review, a movie directed by Lance Oppenheim, written by Ajon Singh, starring Robert Pattinson, Merritt Wever, Skyler Gisondo, Phoebe Bridgers, Matthew Maher, and Alex Winter.
Based on the explosive article, Tonight on Dateline This Man Will Die (2009), written by Luke Dittrich, which chronicles the final and controversial days of the hit show To Catch a Predator (2004), Lance Oppenheim takes us back to the early 2000s to peel back the workings of a show that, on the surface, exposed the evil that preyed on innocence. When, in truth, it was all a passion project about a man who let his delusion ruin his life. In a colorful yet gritty film, Primetime shows us the toll that self-deception takes. And in the end, no one is left standing unscathed.
From the first shot, the film evokes early-2000s analog television, working hard to remind the audience of the era in which the film is set. From the occasional cut to analog screens to small little clip shows every time big names of that era television pop on, showcasing some early 2000s internet interfaces, and a cute AOL sound effect at the start of the movie. Even showing a couple shots of the characters through old analog television sets. These little details really sell the environment the movie is set in. Another point of creative brilliance in the movie’s favor is itʻs coloring. Compared to the lackluster amount of color Hollywood is putting out these days, it’s so refreshing to see a movie that is not embarrassed to embrace and even experiment with color in the film.
Robert Patterson kills it in this movie as Chris Hansen, but more praise should be spread to the other members of the class. Matthew Maher seems to have fun playing Xavier Von Erck, a small-minded man who thinks he is so much cooler than he actually is. Xavier seems to be the guy who thinks heʻs a cool boss/vigilante but comes off as pathetic in everything but pretending to be a child on the internet. Merit Weiner’s character serves as an interesting piece of social commentary. She is the real engine that keeps the show running, but she always feels undervalued as a woman in a man-dominated industry. Her interactions with Xavier really highlight both the latter’s emotional immaturity and the obstacles women face in the film workplace. The film gives her an arc about how much she is willing to take and whether the show is worth the disrespect, while at the same time normalizing and working within her treatment on set. Rounding it off is Alex Winter, who plays the disgraced assistant district attorney Bill Conradt, the show’s final subject and Chris Hansensʻs white whale. Winterʻs does an interesting job never condoning Conradt but showing him as someone who was hesitant to give in to his darker urges. Unlike the other cast members, he is aware of his own hypocrisy. For those who know his story, you can feel the film ominously gain momentum with each passing moment, building toward the climax that makes the story so infamous.
Patterson, perhaps overacting a bit, steals the show, portraying a man torn between his mission and his hypocrisy. Early in the movie, Hanson tells Decoy Dan that nothing he does is acting, but as we see throughout the movie, thats all he is. Maybe he does believe that, or perhaps that is another one of his delusions. He is practicing his lines, his inflections in his speech, working the people around him. He is not duplicitous or maniacally plotting, but he is always performing and angling for the best possible outcome for himself, for his mission. Which is fun because at the core, Patterson plays a priest whoʻs god is himself, and that delusion feeds into the same flaw that all the other characters share: hypocrisy and delusion. Now, Hensworth isn’t a standard cardboard-cutout hypocrite. He isnʻt the kind of predator that he catches for his show; that would be boring and unoriginal. He believes in what he is doing; his mission is his show, and on the surface it is a good cause. But because he puts himself up on this pedestal, because he is on this crusade, it gives him an ego. That, in turn, he slowly strips himself of his normal human connections and attachments. This isolates him, and thus makes his mission all about himself and no one else; thus the hypocrisy. It isnʻt about the parentʻs the kids, or even his kids; as he claims, it’s about him. Hansonʻs ego and mission are corrosive, and there is a tragedy in the fact that his mission will rob him of lasting satisfaction. And that eventually his mission will cost him everything, but it’s the bed he made.
In comparison, Dan Plum, or Decoy Dan, is the movie’s portrayal of innocence. Despite his character being twice his age, Dan has the closest thing to childlike innocence, which slowly diminishes throughout the movie. Unlike the rest of the cast, Dan is always trying to find a moral or just way to balance himself, essentially just being bait for sexual deviance, playing the role of a teenager or young boy. Initially joining on as just an actor, he finds himself way over his head when he comes face to face with predators, and he doesn’t know how to deal with those kinds of people on a day-to-day basis. Skyler Gisondo does a great job in the role, second to Patterson himself. Trying and failing to find purpose and meaning in his “role”. His arc of coming face to face with the reality of his role is both an eye-opener and a stomach-turner. Does he actually catch the bad guys? Is the job really worth exposing himself to these sick people? Danʻs questioning of his own morals and actions is what makes him a great foil to Hanson, who actively enjoys the fate he brings to these lowlifes. His whole arc comes full circle, in a very synchronized way, at the end, about whether what he does is more than a spectacle. If there is one critique about his role in the story, it is that Gisondo doesnʻt always look the part of a 13-year-old boy home alone. However, it’s outweighed by the fact that his story is the very inverse of Hansenʻs, and there is some divine beauty in that.
Primetime does a lot, toying with the line between delusion and hypocrisy. In a show about protecting kids, it exposed that they are a second or third thought in the minds of the people working on it. Everyone is scratching a personal itch to some extent rather than pursuing a true sense of justice. It’s not really surprising how many people in the show, both inside and outside the production, are ready and willing to throw ethics aside for spectacle. In a colorful yet dark retelling of one of the most memorable television moments of the early days of the millennium, Oppenheim delivers on showing the dark side of spectacle.
Rating: 8.3/10
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