Dead Man’s Wire (dir. Gus Van Sant)

by Jack Martin | Mar 21, 2026

Certificate: 15

Running Time: 106 mins

UK Distributor: Vertigo Releasing

UK Release Date: 20 March 2026

WHO’S IN DEAD MAN’S WIRE?

Bill Skarsgård, Dacre Montgomery, Cary Elwes, Myha’la, Colman Domingo, Al Pacino, John Robinson, Kelly Lynch, Todd Gable, Mark Helms, Michael Ashcraft, Neil Mulac, Daniel R. Hill

WHO’S BEHIND THE CAMERA?

Gus Van Sant (director), Austin Kolodney (writer), Noor Alfallah, Remi Alfallah, Mark Amin, Andrea Bucko, Gordon Clark, Tom Culliver, Cassian Elwes, Billy Hines, Joel David Moore, Matt Murphie, Siena Oberman, Paula Paizes, Sam Pressman and Veronica Radaelli (producers), Danny Elfman (composer), Arnaud Potier (cinematographer), Saar Klein (editor)

WHAT’S IT ABOUT?

A disgruntled customer (Skarsgård) holds a mortgage broker (Montgomery) as his hostage…

WHAT ARE MY THOUGHTS ON DEAD MAN’S WIRE?

1977 was a pretty unpredictable year. An obscure space-set fantasy film called Star Wars would change the cultural landscape forever. Elvis Presley died in his early 40s, rumoured to be whilst sitting on the toilet. A start-up tech company named after a fruit introduced one of the very first personal computers to the world. And in Indianapolis during the late wintery month of February, a seemingly ordinary guy named Tony Kiritsis held a mortgage broker hostage for nearly 72 hours with a shotgun wired to the victim’s neck.

That last event is, of course, what director Gus Van Sant’s latest film Dead Man’s Wire chooses to focus on, though it is not the first to depict such a strange real-life event. The similarly named 2018 documentary Dead Man’s Line beat both Van Sant and screenwriter Austin Kolodney to the punch, with that film also serving as heavy inspiration for this one. But even when told through a more contemporary narrative, it’s a story that is no doubt fascinating to watch unfold, and the director – here making his best film in years, possibly since his Oscar-winning 2008 biopic Milk – makes the most of his filmmaking talents to give it a gripping and fruitful sense of life.

The film opens with Kiritsis (Bill Skarsgård) entering the building of a prestigious mortgage company, a suspiciously shotgun-shaped box in hand, for a planned meeting with the wealthy CEO M.L. Hall (Al Pacino), only to find that the tycoon has suddenly buggered off on holiday and that his son Richard (Dacre Montgomery) is there to meet with him in his place. Regardless, Kiritsis holds the younger Hall at gunpoint as he straps a wire attached to said shotgun around his neck which would cause it to blow his head off should there be any sudden movements, and alerts the authorities himself with specific ransom demands in exchange for Hall’s freedom.

As we learn, Kiritsis feels he was badly screwed over by the elder Hall and his company after they interfered on a land development project he was planning, and now wants not just a hefty compensation but also a direct apology from the boss himself, as well as a strict guarantee that he won’t be arrested or charged for his actions. So, as kidnapper and hostage take refuge in the former’s apartment, with the cops and local news reporters all outside, and even local radio DJ Fred Temple (Colman Domingo) being brought in to help diffuse the situation, the clock is ticking for Kiritsis’ demands to be met and for Richard Hall to be freed.

All the while, you’re quite far up to the edge of your seat as Van Sant stages the events of Kolodney’s script with a searing intensity, making it feel as though at any moment a bomb could go off or, more accurately, the booby-trapped shotgun will suddenly be triggered. You’re right there alongside Skarsgård’s Kiritsis and Montgomery as his terrified hostage for most of the movie, and the whole time you’re almost as ready to soil yourself as the latter constantly is because Kiritsis is a truly unhinged character who can be calm and even charming one moment before inflicting violence and screaming until his face turns purple the next. Skarsgård is perfect casting in the role because, unlike some of his far more monstrous performances as Pennywise or Count Orlok, there is a seething and dangerously human anger brewing inside of him that cannot seem to be tamed, which one could argue makes him just as terrifying, if not a little more so, than the actual monsters he’s portrayed over the years.

The director does very well to keep Skarsgård and his fellow supporting actors from going too far over the top, letting them fit naturally into the grounded recreation of 1977 that he has envisioned. Within it, not only are there many close replications of many moments from the well-documented real incident – where, as is inevitable with films like this, the actual people look almost nothing like the actors portraying them – but there is also a strong 70s aesthetic in the way that it’s shot, edited and designed. Its grainy cinematography and loose, almost improvisational tone both recall some of the more naturalistic films from that era such as The French Connection or Dog Day Afternoon (the latter making Pacino’s casting here feel less like a coincidence), and of course the soundtrack is made up of numerous 70s singles which further heighten the overall nostalgia for the decade. It’s a strong recreation that Van Sant has concocted for Dead Man’s Wire, one that could genuinely be mistaken for an actual film from that decade if modern-day actors, from Skarsgård to an ever-cool Domingo to an unrecognisable Cary Elwes, didn’t keep showing up.

Not everything works, for there’s surprisingly little growth with the relationship between kidnapper and hostage. Granted, said relationship is one-sided from the start since one has a shotgun always aimed at their head, but if we’re spending most of the movie with them together there perhaps needed to be a bit more development for the viewer to really feel the weight of their separate issues as things come to a slightly underwhelming but still tense climax. Some of the other supporting actors, including Myha’la as a news reporter seeking her big break with this story, don’t really have a lot to do either, and could easily have been cut from the movie without subtracting anything substantial.

But as a tense and passionate recreation of a rather bizarre real-world crime, Dead Man’s Wire is a solid thriller that amplifies just how strange and unpredictable that year ended up being.

SO, TO SUM UP…

Dead Man’s Wire is a solid thriller from director Gus Van Sant, who lovingly recreates the 70s aesthetic of a bizarre true crime story that’s given strong layers of human anger by an unhinged lead turn by Bill Skarsgård, which are enough to forgive some of its more underdeveloped parts.