2026 is Lance Oppenheim’s year. With not one but two phenomenon released in its latter half, the director of Some Kind of Heaven and Spermworld is experiencing an unprecedented level of attention. The documentary he co-directed with Nathan Fielder, You Can See Everything, is the talk of the town on both sides of the pond for starters, a feat never seen before for a work of non-fiction with a three hour runtime. Those in Europe will have to wait a little longer though, and find solace instead in Oppenheim’s narrative debut, the long-awaited Primetime, starring a slithery, slippery Robert Pattinson in the titular role of To Catch A Predator presenter Chris Hansen. Despite stellar performances from its cast, and a deeply effective atmosphere however, Primetime feels strangely hollow, a character study without much character at all.
Ratings for Hansen’s Predator are already sky high when NBC’s Head Jeff Zucker decides to place it in the primetime slot, in competition with ABC’s Lost. Chris is ecstatic – the team hires a new decoy, Dan Plum (Skyler Gisondo), a struggling actor desperate for membership in the Screen Actors Guild, and expand on the idea of Predator, as Chris becomes obsessed with making the show a commercial success and catching “a whale” (or, someone high-profile). While this focus – along with the threat of a story about his extramarital affairs being released – makes him increasingly erratic, his producer Andie (Merritt Wever) questions her future on the show, and it isn’t long before Predator begins to lose its balance.
While Oppenheim’s mastery of the documentary form is evident here in its subject and editing choices, this is all in all an inherently dramatic retelling of a real story rather than a biographical film (and one, one might add, that Hansen did not agree to). Yet, while the main focus is Hansen himself, there is the sense that, despite Pattinson’s screentime, we spend next to no time with him – he remains strangely elusive, evasive despite his evident savouring of the spotlight, and his various preoccupations feel like tangible plot points rather than a natural evolution of his storyline. While Hansen is busy slipping around proclaiming he does the lord’s work by catching predators on national television, Gisondo’s Dan and Wever’s Andie instead emerge as characters of real emotional depth, he attempting to justify this new job as genuine acting, she increasingly doubtful of Hansen’s respect for her work and sacrifice. This is not to say that Pattinson is inadequate here – on the contrary, his creepiness, bulging vein, licked lips, camera stance, are all admirable work, and typical Pattinson character building. It is just that, in Primetime, Hansen simply just is, almost like a reticence to delve any further than “antihero”.
The story’s pacing is a little off in this sense as well – no sooner has Predator been moved to primetime that problems begin to emerge, without the gleeful satisfaction of so much as a happy-manic montage to quench Hansen’s thirst for success. The result is something that is consistently dark and dreary – yet, almost coincidentally, this lack of variety is its strongest suit. In addition to David Bolen’s excellent cinematography and saturated, pixelated colours, there is the sense of feeling perpetually damp watching Primetime – it never stops raining (or does it?), and everyone looks greasy and tired and motel-laden (which they are), apart from Anna Faris perhaps, whose role can only be described as a disserving cameo. In the gritty, neon-lit night, Oppenheim tentatively addresses the ethical limits of Predator, the blurry boundary between spectacle and justice system. Pattinson as Hansen is adamant that he is a superhero of modern times, and there is something that certainly resonates as true in this, yet in his depiction of both presenter and presentation, Oppenheim showcases Predator for what it really is and what he believes it to be – a trashy television show catering to people’s most depraved appetites.
Primetime screened at the London Film Festival and will be released in UK cinemas on 30 October 2026.
