Dead Man's Wire

2025's DEAD MAN'S WIRE has been compared to DOG DAY AFTERNOON in many quarters and it's easy to see why.  The plot does not involve a robbery but indeed has a kidnapping that draws media attention.  It is also based on a true story and takes place in the gritty old 1970s.  Director Gus Van Sant also takes a cue or two from Sidney Lumet.  And even Al Pacino is in it.

Indianapolis, 1977.  Tony Kiritsis (Bill Skarsgard) was an Everyman who blamed the Meridian Mortgage Company for cheating him out of potential profit from some land he bought, developed into a shopping center.  Blamed them for forcing him into default and deliberately scaring off promising retail tenants.  One day Tony arrives for a meeting with broker M.L. Hall (Al Pacino), only to be met by M.L.'s son Richard (Dacre Montgomery).  We learn dad is on vacation in Florida.  Tony quickly reveals he's here to get restitution.  He rigs a wire attached to a shotgun to Richard's neck.  If he tries to escape or event faints, he is a dead man.

Tony calls the police, steals one of their vehicles, and brings Richard to his apartment, where he will hold his hostage for sixty-three hours.  He wants media attention, to tell the world how he was cheated. He will reach out to local DJ Fred Temple (Colman Domingo), their phone conversation later played over the air.  Tony will booby trap his apartment, lest anyone try an ambush.  

Austin Kolodney's screenplay was assisted by Alan Berry and Mark Enochs, who made a documentary about Tony and his standoff in 2018 called DEAD MAN'S LINE.  That may well be a better movie; docs tend to be versus their fictionalized offspring.  Van Sant does create a compelling telling, beginning with careful attention to period detail.  He creates a believable atmosphere that is an essential starting point for this story.  Arnaud Potier's photography really looks right.  The soundtrack, which very appropriately includes Gil Scott-Heron's "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised", is cracking.

Beyond those things, DEAD MAN'S WIRE has psychological depth, more than expected.  Some welcome bits of humor as well.

I liked that the filmmakers gave Pacino a good, honest speech, which takes Tony to task.  About the cold reality of how interest rates work and the consequences of missed payments. Things like that.  We may understand the young man's frustrations, despair, and maybe even his actions.  I, unlike many other John Q. Citizens depicted (and in real life), don't consider him a hero.   Society tends to lionize folks like Tony Kiritsis, to this day.  Luigi Mangione, anyone?

The only fat in this movie, which Van Sant shot in nineteen days, might be the subplot involving an aspiring TV reporter, Linda Page (Myha'la).  Nothing you haven't seen before.  But then, the entire film can be described that way, especially at this late date.  But fine acting (including that by an unrecognizable Cary Elwes as a cop) and sharp direction keep this humming. Overall, a none too shabby heir to Lumet's aforementioned classic film.