Film review: Primetime

Robert Pattinson in one of his most unusual roles to date as Chris Hansen.

Robert Pattinson's third big role of 2026 may be his most fascinating yet. In Primetime, directed by Lance Oppenheim, he dazzles and intrigues in an inspired take on Dateline NBC's To Catch a Predator and the intense production cycle behind it.

Based on Luke Dittrich's 2007 Esquire article, the film follows host Chris Hansen as ratings pressure mounts and his obsession with making the show the biggest thing on television tips into something far darker. It's a heavy premise, and the film leans into its absurdity and horror in equal measure.

Pattinson is excellent as Hansen. He has always flexed a bizarrely good ear for voices, from Mickey 17 to The Odyssey, but here he transforms completely. He has said he prepared by constantly imitating Hansen's voice in public, and the commitment shows. His Hansen is a more exaggerated, off-kilter version of the real man. He nails the primetime TV sneer and pomp and shows real range in the backstage meltdowns. That heightened take pays off twice. It makes for wonderfully unpredictable drama, and it conveys an unsettling obsession with commercial success over moral superiority, which is exactly what the film prods at. It's also a perfect match for the gloriously trippy mess of the film's editing, visuals and soundtrack.

If Pattinson carries the dizzying, cluttered drama, Skyler Gisondo is the film's heart, and at times the protagonist of his own story. He plays Dan, a starving artist in the LA acting scene who jumps at the chance to work when the role of decoy is offered. It looks like a great shot at reaching TV screens. Instead, Dan faces the mental strain of coming face to face with real monsters, while losing the respect of his fellow actors. It's an interesting angle, and it adds a lot of meat to what could have been an all-flash, no-substance script. Gisondo's natural warmth makes Dan's slow slide from excitement to unease easy to buy into.

If anything, I wanted more of it. One moment of Dan on the phone to a predator has stuck with me most, with guilt and shame lingering in the air as he lures someone to their doom. A deeper dive into this side of the story would have sealed the deal for me.

Merritt Wever deserves a mention too. As Hansen's producer, Andie Bender is quiet and controlled, and that restraint is a smart counterweight to Pattinson's showier turn. The film is at its best when these two energies clash.

Given its subject, the film naturally broaches plenty of heavy topics. True justice versus exploitative justice is the most obvious. The crew's main goal is primetime success, not real consequences, and the film spares no expense in showing it, even as the stakes ramp up in a disturbing final act. Everything it touched on was thoroughly interesting. My one gripe is that it doesn't quite follow its ideas all the way through. The questions it raises about true versus exploitative justice and the cost of chasing ratings are provoking, and they stay with you, but the film moves on before digging as deep as it could. Either zeroing in on one idea, or leaning fully into the chaos of several, would have pushed a very good film into the landmark territory it's clearly reaching for. It's one notch away from that, and it's the only thing keeping this from a higher score.

It's also surprisingly funny, and thankfully never at the expense of the subject matter. The uneasy laughs often help, revealing how absurd and obsessed Hansen is, and how his team's steering of televised justice is more obsessive spectacle than actual justice.

Oppenheim's direction is engaging in its uneasy psychedelia. Much like Pattinson's unhinged performance, the film opts for a deeply saturated palette, long fading edits and swirling crosscuts that create a dreamlike experience. It works because the film adopts the look of the TV it's critiquing. David Bolen's cinematography draws on a patchwork of camera formats, including 16mm, to recreate the grainy, lurid texture of mid-2000s television, while Daniel Garber's editing blurs the line between the show being made and the film we're watching. We're pulled into the same compulsive spiral as the crew, which makes the discomfort land harder. Ari Balouzian's score, a haunted fairytale that glitches in and out, adds to the unease. It's a film worth seeing on the best screen and sound you can manage, so with Black Friday around the corner, pop into your local Richer Sounds for a TV or soundbar deal that does that palette and score justice.

Overall, Primetime is gripping, funny and deeply uncomfortable. It stops just short of a landmark, but Pattinson's unhinged turn and Gisondo's heartfelt one makes it a standout watch of the year. If you can stomach the discomfort, it's well worth your time, and it will leave you thinking long after the credits roll.