Mind the CONTENT WARNING and buckle up, folks. There’s a lot to unpack with this one. Given the subject matter and the involvement of producer Ari Aster, this is gonna be a long and bumpy ride.
“To Catch A Predator” started out as a Dateline NBC segment in 2004. Pretty much immediately, the world knew host Chris Hansen as the guy who would lure unsuspecting pedophiles to “have a seat over there” and confront them with the evidence of their own crimes before handing them over to the authorities. The segment was such an astoundingly popular smash hit that it was spun off into its own series, and eventually given a primetime slot against the ratings juggernaut that was “Lost”. (Remember, those post-9/11 years in the mid-00’s were a dark time for mainstream media.)
But quickly, and perhaps inevitably, disaster struck. I hasten to add that precious little of this was ever proven in court, so any criminal activities are only alleged.
In July 2006, in the course of their usual research (i.e. posing as young children online to bait potential pedophiles), the “Predator” team crossed paths with someone in the Texas county of Rockwall. Long story short, they traced the explicit text messages back to none other than Bill Conradt Jr., an assistant district attorney. So of course the “Predator” crew went to Murphy, TX, to set up a more elaborate sting in November 2006.
What followed was a mad dash to try and arrest Conradt before he could cover his tracks. Also, NBC wanted ratings and creative control while the local police wanted the prestige of arresting a high-profile sexual predator on national television. News, entertainment, and law enforcement all fought with each other to try and control the room with conflicting objectives and ideas. Mistakes were made. Stupid mistakes. Fatal mistakes.
When the dust had cleared, Conradt was dead of a gunshot wound, self-inflicted while the arrest was being attempted. Conradt’s surviving family sued NBC for wrongful death and the case was settled out of court. Twenty-three other suspects were caught in the sting operation and the DA declined to prosecute them. The relevant episodes aired in mid-February of 2007 and the show was cancelled a few months later.
So here we are with Primetime, in which these events are dramatized by screenwriter Ajon Singh and director Lance Oppenheim, both making their feature narrative debuts (though Oppenheim does have a long and accomplished history as a documentarian). To their credit, the filmmakers have gone out of their way not to promote the film as “based on a true story”. Numerous characters are composites or film originals. Hansen himself (here played by exec producer Robert Pattinson) had no involvement whatsoever — in fact, he outright hates the end result. From start to finish, it’s perfectly obvious that the filmmakers were not interested in delivering any kind of faithful or accurate depiction, so much as they wanted to deliver a more heightened cinematic discussion of the topics involved.
(Although NBC exec Jeff Zucker briefly shows up to play himself.)
There is a lot going on here, given all the metric tons of controversy over what the show did and how they did it. I can’t stress enough that this pedophile-baiting business is serious shit. The physical danger is real. The mental/emotional toll is catastrophic. Even the legal danger involved is exorbitant. Anybody who engages with this stuff on any level is walking away with some kind of damage. So imagine the kind of person that it takes to make this into a career, and try to imagine who or what will come out the other side of that career.
(Side note: I feel compelled to point out that multiple times in this movie, it’s the decoy who takes the initial steps of sexual discussion and/or arranging a meeting. For my part, I’ve seen enough Trilogy Media to know that this is not best practice. If the investigator makes those first moves, it opens the door to legal liability and entrapment claims. If it’s the suspect who always makes the first move, it builds a stronger case.)
On one side, you’ve got Xavier Von Erck (Matthew Maher), the eccentric founder of the “Perverted Justice” online activism group. He’s effectively the “research specialist” of the team, scouring the Internet to bait and trap sleazeballs. Trouble is, he’s the kind of guy who’s spent too much time behind a keyboard pretending to be a pervert’s preteen wet dream. His “quirks” put him at odds with the rest of the team, and his agenda puts him into conflict with the producers. Indeed, we see for ourselves that the team will make a point of prioritizing the cases that work best with the production schedule and/or make for better television.
Which brings us to Andie Bender (Merritt Wever), the show’s producer. Here we have someone with the unenviable task of trying to keep the crew grounded. It’s a thankless job, but somebody has to speak for the viewing audience and the network that’s bankrolling all of this. Moreover, it’s entirely possible that she’s focusing on the materialistic “showbiz” aspect as her own means of coping and keeping a healthy emotional distance. Because when the chips are down and she has to deal hands-on with this shit and the damage it causes… well, she’s not always as unshakeably competent as she appears, we’ll put it that way.
Then we’ve got Cortland Gunn (Bokeem Woodbine), a Texas sheriff with a strictly binary view of justice, whose answer to pretty much everything is some degree of brutality. This brings up a fascinating counterpoint to the notion that Hansen and his team are vigilantes accusing and condemning people in the court of public opinion without due process. Then again, Hansen himself points out that public shaming is nothing new — older civilizations had stocks and pillories, we’ve got television and social media. More importantly, much as it sounds right and proper to let the police handle this, it’s not always like the cops are necessarily any better.
Say what you will about Xavier and his zealotry, but at least he’s working with altruistic intentions and sincerely working to make the world a better place. Compare that with some of his colleagues, who are working for ratings and ad revenue. And for all his fire and brimstone, Gunn is clearly focused on looking good for his re-election campaign above anything else. Then again, if justice can only be served by those who are truly flawless and selfless, then there will never be any justice until the Second Coming, if that.
Of course we get the occasional suspect who tries to deflect and shame Hansen, calling him an extortionist and asking what right he has to pass judgment on others. To be sure, there’s no way Hansen or anyone else on his team could’ve possibly done anything worse than preying on young children for their own sexual gratification. But the fact remains that there is zero compassion on either side of the equation here.
It bears repeating that the act of pedophile-baiting is a harmful and perilous job by its very nature. Granted, the same could be said of exterminating common household pests. Even so, if something causes physical/mental/emotional damage and it’s done without any kind of compassion at all… well, that sounds like a pretty convincing definition of evil, doesn’t it? Reasonable minds can argue all day about rights and wrongs and necessities, but even a necessary evil is still evil. Even a lesser evil is still evil.
Then again, to paraphrase what’s probably the greatest line of the movie, there can be vastly different definitions of the word “bad”.
Caught in the middle of all these conflicting priorities and viewpoints, we have two protagonists. One of them, obviously, is Hansen. The other is Dan Plum (Skyler Gisondo), an aspiring actor who signs on to work as a decoy for the team. So he’s playing a 13-year-old boy and making himself into bait for pedophiles. Though at least he’s got a veteran decoy (Del, played by Phoebe Bridgers) to give him a little pep talk about the dangers involved, so he’s got that going for him.
(Side note: As shown in the movie, Dan prepped for the job with a montage of clips from Sling Blade and Billy Bob Thornton’s portrayal of that film’s lead character. Strange choice. I’m not sure if I see the connection between a developmentally-challenged Arkansas ex-con and an innocent 13-year-old kid.)
“Decoy Dan” is positioned to take the greatest mental/emotional harm and also the greatest mental/emotional reward. Even if he’s lying to shitbag sexual predators, he’s still leading unsuspecting people to their own ruination. Even well-intentioned dishonesty can wear a man down after enough lies over enough time.
Sure, he’s an actor who plays characters and lies for a living, but that’s not the same thing as lying to a paying audience and we all know it. That said, is this really how a young up-and-coming actor wants to earn his SAG card? After all the hours spent talking and acting behind the scenes, he’ll only be onscreen for a split-second each episode playing underage pedo-bait. And this could be the work that defines his career and public image for the rest of his life.
Even so, the fact remains that he’s taking on all this hard work to try and catch criminals. Every sick and twisted monster who chases after him is monster who will never harm another child ever again. There’s an argument to be made that he’s saving innocent children and building a far greater legacy than most actors could ever dream of.
That said, it bears remembering that the “Predator” team travels all over the nation. Hansen traces his origin story back to when he investigated a child trafficking operation in India. Tony Revolori gamely plays a recently divorced Marine veteran with a kid of his own and a sexual predilection for other people’s kids. There’s a showstopping confrontation with another pedophile (the one played by Bob Ari, I think) who’s a rabbi. There’s a sight gag involving Jared from Subway. And of course we can’t forget the assistant district attorney. (No way am I spoiling who plays him. My jaw hit the floor.)
The point being that this is a pervasive issue. Hansen didn’t invent the concept of shaming sexual predators on mass media, and there have been plenty of shows that picked up where he left off. (Again, Trilogy Media.) There have always been sexual predators, there will always be sexual predators, and there’s no telling who could secretly be one. Moreover, if this is such a deeply systemic problem, maybe there’s something bigger going on that we need to identify and deal with. Sure, picking off pedophiles one or two at a time is certainly better than nothing, but it won’t be enough in the long run.
Then again, it’s a universally accepted truth that we all have our own secrets and sins and vices, all we’re talking about is a matter of degree. Case in point: Consider Gunn, the cop who responds to suspected sex crimes with guns blazing. Earlier in the film, Hansen meets a random fan (Creed Bratton) with makeup and camerawork and line delivery clearly designed to make him look like a monster, openly fantasizing about torturing and killing sex offenders.
Hansen responds with the argument that what he’s doing might be its own, even worse kind of torture. And he could very well be right. More to the point, we’ve got child predators, we’ve got violent cops, we’ve got violent citizens, and we’ve got a journalist who commits no greater violence than public shaming. Why are some of these men demonized while the others aren’t? Maybe all of them should be demonized? Yes, we as a society have to draw the line somewhere, but where?
Now, I know what you’re all asking: Where the hell is Robert Pattinson? Where is our leading actor, playing the host of this TV show, and what does any of this have to do with him? Simply put, EVERYTHING. Folks, this portrayal of Chris Hansen is the keystone. I had to go through all of that other shit first because Hansen is directly at the center of it.
It’s Hansen who has to balance his own personal quest for justice with the network’s quest for ratings. It’s Hansen who struggles to drag criminals into the sunlight while also struggling with his jealousy of praise and attention given to other “serious” journalists (mostly Stone Phillips, here played by Bill Heck). It’s Hansen who reckons with his own personal flaws (mostly his marital infidelities, with Caroline Hebert playing his mistress) against his career and reputation as an arbiter of justice.
It’s Hansen who continually sacrifices time with his family (most especially his wife, played by Anna Faris) to look after his production crew. I was particularly fond of the scene in which Hansen shows an episode of his TV show — the show about sexual assault of minors, remember — to try and bond with his sons. Who have no idea what they’re watching because they’re five years old at most. Contrast that against Hansen’s relationship with Dan, which is obviously and repeatedly framed as a kind of surrogate father/son rapport. The point being that Hansen has been so thoroughly broken by his work that he can’t even function as a father without it.
I could keep going, but I think I’ve made the point that Primetime is a film as superbly made as it is deeply uncomfortable. Everyone involved delivers a top-tier work — in particular, Pattinson and Gisondo deliver dynamic and transformational performances. The best thing I can say about this movie is that while it’s only 110 minutes long, it will invite discussions and ruminations that will keep going for long after the credits roll.
This is the kind of film I’m glad I saw once and only once. If you’re looking for some light and breezy Halloween fun, check out the new Shaun the Sheep movie. If you’re looking for an authentic depiction of the actual events, I can’t possibly stress enough that this is not that. But if you want something bold and challenging and thought-provoking, something that takes a long and hard look at the soul of this sick media-saturated and dollar-obsessed country, here’s your movie.
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