Overview

• Premiering out of competition at the Venice Film Festival, the film received an extended standing ovation with chants for the director.
• The thriller dramatizes Tony Kiritsis’s 1977 Indianapolis hostage standoff featuring a shotgun rigged with a “dead man’s wire” during a roughly 63-hour siege.
• Bill Skarsgård plays Kiritsis opposite Dacre Montgomery as Richard Hall, joined by Colman Domingo, Myha’la, Cary Elwes and Al Pacino.
• Critics note taut craft and a tense opening sequence but describe the overall effect as uneven or cautious, even as Skarsgård’s performance earns strong notices.
• Van Sant said production began before the December 2024 Luigi Mangione shooting and recent political events, which heightened the story’s relevance, and he did not alter the script; the film is seeking U.S. distribution.