Primetime: Critics Praise Robert Pattinson’s Turn as Chris Hansen After Venice Premiere

The useful part

A24 's Primetime, which premiered Saturday at the Venice Film Festival to a nearly eight-minute standing ovation, holds a 93 percent critics score on Rotten Tomatoes. Directed by Lance Oppenheim, Primetime follows Pattinson as Hansen, the former Dateline NBC host who became famous for confronting suspected child predators on camera through To Catch a Predator. The film also stars Merritt Wever, Skyler Gisondo, Phoebe Bridgers and Bokeem Woodbine.

How it works

• Endgame' Powers $26M Return at Crowded Box Office Hansen, who initially questioned Hollywood's motives by making the film, has since given Pattinson credit for the work he put into portraying him.
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• "Obviously he has practiced imitating me, and while I think it's overly dramatic, I think there is a pretty good imitation there in the trailer," Hansen recently told Entertainment Tonight.
• Rooney wrote, "Robert Pattinson is equal parts cracked and chilling as host Chris Hansen, portraying him as a ruthless ratings hunter with a grandiosity complex and a chip on his shoulder because he's not...
• " BBC's Nicholas Barber also applauded the actor, writing, "His performance in Primetime is exaggerated and theatrical without ever being arch.

What to take from it

He plays Hansen as a slippery creep, sometimes buffoonish in his self-confidence and sometimes sinister, and sometimes on the verge of madness. The key could be that Pattinson never asks us to sympathise with the character. In fact, it's so in love with its flawed protagonist that it can't see he's the least compelling character in the movie, an ambitious, arrogant, grasping, unscrupulous man we've met countless times before.

Example or evidence

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Details worth keeping

He is completely immersed in the character's strangeness. In fact, he seems happy for us to loathe him. Brennan wrote, " Primetime isn't a Chris Hansen hit piece.

Related coverage

• Forbes: Primetime, starring Robert Pattinson as Dateline NBC's "To Catch a Predator" host Chris Hansen, is finally being reviewed by the real-life Hansen and a bigger number of Rotten Tomatoes critics.
• Screendaily: Merritt Wever is also memorable in Lance Oppenheim's feature debut, which bows in Venice competition
• Vulture: The actor's unhinged performance as Chris Hansen, host of the mid-2000s reality hit To Catch a Predator, is a demonstration of his range.
• Thewrap: Including Star Wars and superheroes and BookTok, oh my!