The Hunt

by Hans A. Carpenter
Release Date: March 13
MPAA: R
Director: Craig Zobel
Starring: Betty Gilpin,
Ike Barinholtz,
and Emma Roberts
A group of poor right-wingers find themselves scattered around a country estate being hunted by the Liberal elite. One of the captured begins to fight back, and the hunters may become the hunted.
The Hunt has garnered a lot of controversy for its taking our real world political divisions and turning it into a gory satire. There’s commentary going on for sure, but much of it’s half-baked. Sure it gets good jabs in at both sides of the political extreme, and has some fun with literal class warfare and cancel culture, but it just isn’t that smart. The ingredients are there for a nihilistic takedown of everyone in the current political climate, but The Hunt shoots just a bit off the mark.
Some of the action sequences and suspense are great, but the hammy acting and ham-fisted attempt at satire combine for a movie that’s less gleefully surreal and more, meh. If you like gore, yeah you’ll have fun. The pacing generally works too. At the end of the day though, The Hunt is lacking. It feels, really, really close to being good, but you can get a better version of the “rich people violently kill” movie with Ready or Not which is way more unique and memorable.
Ultimately, The Hunt has all the bullets to shoot right into the heart of our divided society but can’t seem to put them in the right chambers. It’s ultimately pretty forgettable.