Most of the time when I hear about a movie being remade, I roll my eyes.  Though this may not be news, it is worth repeating: Hollywood is not terribly creative.  Like any business, they make what they think will sell.  There are independent studios out there that will put out material with more artistic license, but they will not be the ones that will put the popcorn eating audiences in the seats.  Unfortunately, that audience includes this Catholic reviewer, a soul who dreams of cinematic content with substance.  Today’s movie, The Running Man, would have all the criteria to make me sigh as I headed into the theater save for the fact that it is directed by Edgar Wright.  As my favorite auteur, I felt I would be in good hands even if this is not a new story.  If you have seen the 1987 version with Arnold Schwareznegger as Ben Richards, then you might be expecting something similar.  The titles are the same, the themes are roughly equivalent, but the delivery is something else.

What Ben Richards (Glenn Powell) wants is to do something else other than becoming The Running Man.  As he is trying, and failing, to get his former boss to give him his old job back, he promises his sick child that he will not become so desperate as to audition to be a contestant on the eponymous television show.  He is desperate for other reasons, and this is why he has his daughter, Cathy Richards (Alyssa and Sienna Benn), with him.  As he angrily walks out of the office and sees the omnipresent network televisions airing the lineup of deadly game shows, he does have an idea.  While at home waiting for his wife, Sheila Richards (Jayme Lawson), to return from another long shift as a waitress at a club, he watches these contests and considers trying out.  Upon Sheila entering their humble cheap side apartment, he tells her he is going to the network to audition and bring in some real money.  Nothing goes as he hopes from the start.  We see early on why he has been fired from a number of jobs and blacklisted from further employment.  In this dystopian future, those who own the means of production do not take kindly to heroes, and everything he had done to get him let go had been in service of his co-workers.  Between his distrust for the system and his desire to get his child medicine, he is in a foul mood after giving a hand to another man in line in distress and being beaten for his actions.  Because of his aggressiveness, during his trials he is identified as a candidate for the program on which he told his daughter he would not be appearing.  Before this, he is given a meeting with the show’s creator and producer Dan Killian (Josh Brolin).  During their discussion, Ben wants nothing to do with The Running Man, but Dan makes it clear that the father is perfect for the network’s most popular show.  Besides, with the money Ben could potentially earn, he would significantly improve the life of his family.  With that, he reluctantly signs the contract with the promise that Cathy and Sheila will be kept some place safe during the course of his run.  The next day, it begins with two other contestants, Tim Jansky (Martin Herlihy) and Jenni Laughlin (Katy O’Brian), joining him.  They are brought out to meet the host, Bobby “Bobby T” Thompson (Colman Domingo), who stirs the crowd with doctored backstories and footage of these supposedly terrible people who need to be dealt with by society.  They are also given the rules, which involve monetary incentives for killing the people after them, like various authorities called “goons” or the shows own “hunters.”  The main one is that for every day they stay alive for the next thirty days, they need to send in a video of themselves talking about their progress.  Once Ben is on the loose, his first move is to visit Molie Jernigan (William H. Macy), a sort of underground pawn shop owner who reluctantly assists Ben with fake identification and disguises.  With these items, Ben makes his way to New York City, but the hunters quickly learn about Molie.  This is Ben’s suspicion anyway, so he decides to stay on the move, this time traveling to Boston.  Once there, he finds room in which to briefly hide before he is found by the hunters.  In the process of escaping, he accidentally burns down the building.  The network plays it as essentially an act of terrorism, but luckily he is found by Bradley Throckmorton (Daniel Ezra).  He and his family are part of an underground resistance to the network and its insidious partnership with the government to control society.  Bradley blames his little sister’s sickness on the system, which Ben relates to based on his daughter’s struggles.  Bradley is able to connect Ben with other members of their rebellion, although Ben is adamant that he is not in this for a revolution.  He just wants to get back to his family.  After moving carefully up the east coast into Maine via freight train, he finally comes to the house of Elton Parrakis (Michael Cera).  Having seen his father, a former police officer, murdered by goons, Elton is a little too eager to take on the authorities.  Thus, while he is helping Ben to win, it is Elton that signals their location to the network in order to kill a number of his enemies.  Before dying during their escape, Elton gives Ben a map to his father’s hidden survival bunker in the woods.  Instead of going there, Ben continues to go north towards Canada.  Along the way, he hijacks the car of young socialite Amelia Williams (Emilia Jones), but even this act is worked into the program by Dan.  At the same time, Ben is able to convince Amelia that he is not the monster he has been portrayed to be.  As such, she helps him to convince them to give him a plane to fly to Canada.  However, it turns out that his ratings are too high to let die.  This is part of the pitch Dan gives Ben once they are in the air, encouraging him to kill the other hunters that are on the crew and take their place.  To inspire the contestant, Dan tells Ben that his family has been killed.  An enraged Ben does manage to murder the hunters, but then turns down Dan’s offer.  Instead, the people rise up against the network after Ben figures out a way of ejecting from the cockpit before it is struck by a missile.  From there, he is able to be reunited with his family and lead the attack on the network.

The fact that Ben is a part of this attack at the end of The Running Man is an example of how the film blurs the lines of reality.  It also marks a different style for Wright.  He has made other films that can be construed as violent, though that is not why this Catholic likes his work.  It is his filming style that has always attracted me.  He has a way of cutting between scenes that I have always found satisfying.  A movie can be fast-paced because of the action.  Wright’s work has always enhanced these moments.  In this one, though, he seemed to take an anlternative approach.  It is more of a traditional mode of filming, and I am not sure it works as well as his other projects.  A good example would be Baby Driver (2017).  It is unmistakably a Wright production, with the movement from moment to moment emphasized by each pull of the gear shift or hairpin turn.  All the beats are punctuated by a musical soundtrack, which is also worked into the plot as being something that Baby (Ansel Elgort) essentially needs to function.  It is clever and as action-packed as The Running Man.  Yet, with this latest work, it appears that Wright decided to take fewer chances.  I am not sure what to account for as to the reason for the end product.  Nor do I wish to cast aspersions on it.  I enjoyed it, but I kept looking for that signature Wright moment that never came.

What is more enjoyable about The Running Man is the main character, Ben.  I say this particularly from my Catholic perspective.  There are some small and subtle ways in which he is satisfying.  One might immediately point to the fact that one of his disguises is a priest, although there are some disappointing aspects to this portrayal.  First, he using a stereotypical Irish accent.  Dear Hollywood, the day for Catholics being predominantly Irish in the United States has long been finished.  Secondly, they have him recommending contraception to somebody.  I get that he is not a real priest, but that is kind of the point.  Still, seeing a sympathetic protagonist wearing the clericals was somewhat of a treat.  A bigger treat is the motto that develops around Ben to make him a symbol for the resistance.  As he continues to survive days, the audience inside and outside the studio begins to shout “Richards Lives!”  Hearing the chants and seeing the signs, I could not help but think of the Christian equivalent, “Jesus lives!”  The parallels between the two are inexact, of course.  One has trouble envisioning the Messiah in such a setting as Ben’s.  At the same time, they are both saviors, albeit Ben a more reluctant one to Jesus’ ordained mission.  At the same time, what they do is always bigger than themselves, and they are willing to lay down their lives to accomplish it.  Throughout the proceedings, Ben makes the claim that he is no hero, and I am confident in saying that Jesus would subscribe to such an idea.  Although Jesus knew of His eventual Passion, He asked God to take that Chalice from him during His agony in the garden.  Yet, with the salvation of mankind on the line, how could He have chosen differently.  Ben’s stakes are much lower, though no less important to him.  What these experiences show is that God allows us to confront difficult moments.  It is how we respond to them that can make us heroic, an opportunity enhanced when you call upon God.

If you have an opportunity to see The Running Man, then it would be worth your time.  Then again, I would say that about any Wright film, including Last Night in Soho (2021).  There are a few inappropriate scenes The Running Man, but nothing that overwhelms the rest of the material.  Otherwise, it is a solid piece of cinema.