Some people believe that the game show “represents the return to the barbarism of the Roman Colosseum,” Dan Killian, the creator of a prime-time adrenaline-rush of a show says, having just signed Ben Richards as his latest contender. It’s also seriously lucrative. “Even surviving for one week would put the Richards into the top one percent of global wealth,” he says, handing Ben a retainer. If Ben survives on the run for thirty days without being caught by one of the “hunters,” he wins one billion dollars.
The politics in “The Running Man” (Paramount Pictures), showing now at the Montrose Playhouse, is not exactly subtle. Let us dispense with it in short order, making use of a couple of specific examples. First, the three-syllable cry of the game-show audience, “Hunt him down” raps with “Lock her up” from Donald Trump’s first presidential campaign (against Hillary Clinton in 2016). Second, charismatic white men who run television networks and base their decision-making solely upon ratings—truth and honesty be damned—feels very mid-twenty-twenties.
But in “The Running Man,” a visually spectacular and immensely exciting film, none of it comes across as cheesy. In fact it really works—and this is an action movie as good as anything that will be played on ratings-obsessed British television channels at Christmas.
Ben, played by Glen Powell, is wily, nifty and brassy; despite his wife’s strong objections—“Ben, we need you. Watch yourself.”—he is determined to outsmart the “Network” and make quick money. And so, in a series of sassily-dialogued scenes inside the Network’s ostentatious corporate headquarters, he undergoes several stages of assessment: physical, “This is a rest period. Assessments resume in sixty seconds;” word-association, “‘Justice’-‘Hilarious.’ ‘Freedom’-‘No;’” and eventually a conclusion is drawn—“You are…the angriest person to ever audition for our shows.”—leading to the contract being signed. “That anger’s your superpower,” the boss, played by Josh Brolin—who is in ecstatic love with himself every time he shows up—says. Mr Brolin has turned into something of a modern-day Michael Douglas: a highly experienced, well-respected actor with good hair who can play the boss in whatever situation the particular movie requires. And so, to prime-time television. Ben unexpectedly finds himself being wound-up on purpose; upon his first appearance on the show, he is described as a “healthy thirty-five year old man who thinks he’s too good to work for a living.”
Ben runs along country roads and through corridors in hotels and along drains accompanied by rats. He is periodically emboldened by people motivated to beat the Network. These excellent characters propel the film by emphasising the ambiguity of Ben’s mission. Nor everyone wants to “hunt him down”—in fact some people believe him to be a freedom fighter. The best of these character appears early on. Bradley, played by Daniel Ezra, shelters Ben in Boston after a rollercoaster scene set in a flea-pit guest house, during which Ben is jerked this way and that on a rope dangling from one of the skewiff sparkling-yellow letters making the hotel’s rooftop neon sign, wearing just a delicately placed towel. Bradley’s substantial role in the plot development is to explain the facts of life to Ben. It’s all about the ratings. If you increase the show’s ratings “they keep you alive for fourteen days,” he says. After all, “The network owns the news. They own the government.”
Sometimes a character in a fast-moving film like “The Running Man” is near-invisible in a sea of so many distractions. We practically miss them, even though their presence is essential and they seem to have always been there. In “The Running Man” this character is the game-show host. Bobby T, sure-handedly played by a terrific Colman Domingo, who can even liven up the line “join us at eight o’clock,” is a dream character, at once captivating, horrifying and exciting the audience. As he hosts the live footage, Bobby T’s voice vaults with excitement. “Richards, you’re going down!” he yells exultantly. But pay attention to the smoothness with which he moves between his ensnared audiences. In Ben’s first appearance, Bobby T turns to him and says, in a whisper, “Come on kid, it’s show time. Chill out a bit!” But then he is right back to the showman role: “Do you have any famous
last
words?” he asks; the [gaps] between the words just one moment too long. The whole scene is remarkable—screens within screens, live audience, cameras everywhere—and almost unbearably loud on the Dolby Atmos surround-sound system.
In a later scene, Bobby T appears in a purple tuxedo. A message has just been sent to Ben saying, “Dead. Hunter. Bonus. Awarded.” That night’s prime-time instalment? “Congratulations, you just took down a hunter.” And then, to the rapturous studio audience, “Can you smell it? The acrid stink of fear!” Now back to the camera to implore those watching on television, “Keep your eyes on him so you can see the terror in his. And Hunt! Him! Down!” “I’m on the murder show,” Ben says. “Here I am a grown-arse man playing hide-and-seek for money.”
Industrial Light and Magic, the best in the business, are the first of many special-effects production companies listed in the end credits. The investment in I.L.M. pays huge dividends: the optical effects are stunning. The corporate-logo colours of the Network—Santa-Claus red—are so thoroughly embedded into the production design that it’s like watching wallpaper. Even the omnipresent bowling-ball-shaped drones have a red halo surrounding the internal camera.
While at times the film caters a touch too much to followers of the “Fast-and-Furious” series, expert hands shape “The Running Man,” part of which was shot in Glasgow, into an exhilarating and thought-provoking adventure. “How fast can you run, Richards?” Bradley, the helper in Boston, asks. Ben replies, “Faster every day.”
Adam Poole
14th November 2025
If you are interested in viewing this screening, please book your tickets here
