Catching predators in the name of fame
⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 3 out of 4
Documentarian Lance Oppenheim (“Ren Faire,” “Spermworld”) steps into the narrative feature-scape with this lurid submersion into the early years of online predation, where chatrooms were used as Venus flytraps to snare underage targets and goad them into real-life meetups. The scummy underbelly, as Oppenheim depicts it in “Primetime,” isn’t seen so much in dirty basement dungeons as in the relish Dateline NBC reporter Chris Hansen and his crew on “To Catch a Predator” take in the lewd exchanges as they try to lure the next would-be predator.
Hansen and members of an online activist group baited a potential perpetrator online and goaded him or her into a real-life meetup at a camera-rigged house. They used a decoy (a paid actor posing as the underage target) to let the miscreant inside before Hansen, “Candid Camera”-style, sauntered in and cornered the suspect. The show was filled with quotes from their salacious online transcripts and questions about intent, as the cops waited outside, ready to swarm in.
The show’s controversial kick, though not really illuminated in this film (instead, see David Osit’s gritty 2025 doc, “Predators”), was that most of the perps had no real record and weren’t likely to be prosecuted. NBC brass feared that the exposure might cause someone — specifically those with mental health issues — to take their life. Such a fallout situation led to the show’s cancelation and a subsequent lawsuit. For what it’s worth, Hansen is still at it with his streaming series “Takedown with Chris Hansen” on TruBlu.
In “Primetime,” Oppenheim and writer Ajon Singh home in more deeply on the psyches of Hansen and his team — their motivation for why they do what they do — than those of the people they corral. Hansen, played by Robert Pattinson with steely, suave bravado, wants legitimacy, a bigger slice of the pie and adoration. The role is a bold feather in the cap for Pattinson, who continues to prove his versatility and is becoming one of the most interesting actors working today. Then there’s Xavier Von Erck, the founder of the online activist group Perverted Justice, who partners with Hansen to reel in the chatroom predators — a job they enjoy a tad too much. Von Erck is played by Cambridge Rindge and Latin grad (and classmate of Ben Affleck and Matt Damon) Matthew Maher, who worked with the “Good Will” wonder twins as Nike shoe designer Peter Moore in the Air Jordan creation pic “Air” (2023). In tow, too, are indie pop priestess and indie film actress (“I Saw the TV Glow”) Phoebe Bridgers and Skyler Gisondo as struggling actors who make a decent dollar as face-to-face decoys. Most intriguing, however, is Merritt Wever as Andie, Hansen’s steadfast producer who holds the whole quivering show together. Wever deservedly gets more time center stage after small but pivotal turns in “Marriage Story” (2019) and “Birdman” (2014).
Oppenheim leans in on the grainy video camera, capturing its last days, as well as color saturation and lens distortions to underscore Hansen’s moral ambiguity, ethical fraying, and sellout soul. Oliver Stone did a similar trick with more frenetic effusiveness in “Natural Born Killers” (1994), when the cynical hand skewered the muckraking media for pushing the morality envelope to garner higher and higher audience ratings (today, it’s clicks and likes). Oppenheim, on the other hand, is more concerned with the seeds of evil and their viral capabilities. Early on, you can feel the moral corruption seeping through the crew as they wallow on the dark side of the Web 2.0 and engage with the sick, pandering hyenas lingering on the fringe. There’s rot on both sides of the chat window and Hansen, as the film has it (he’s come out publicly against the film), regularly pours gasoline on smoldering embers, even as a personal controversy of his own making simmers in the background and threatens to come to life. It’s never good when the National Enquirer calls.
The film’s arc is something of an Ahab-like descent into madness as Hansen’s show gets moved into the same TV time slot as “Lost,” which had people massing up for weekly watch parties. Which, I guess, says a lot about the American mindset at the time — what to watch: a parade of predators or polar bears on a tropical island?
Regardless, “Primetime” is a solid narrative coming-out party for Oppenheim and a deft bit of filmmaking, alluringly evocative of recent moody, lo-fi art horror films like “Backrooms,” “Obsession” and “Strange Darling.” Also, the film is all Pattinson, deep into the role, compelling and charismatic as much as he’s repugnant. One can only imagine the actor on the last day of shooting, skipping the wrap party and taking a two-day soak in industrial-strength antibacterial., says a lot about the American mindset at the time — what to watch: a parade of predators or polar bears on a tropical island?
Regardless, “Primetime” is a solid narrative coming-out party for Oppenheim and a deft bit of filmmaking, alluringly evocative of recent moody, lo-fi art horror films like “Backrooms,” “Obsession” and “Strange Darling.” Also, the film is all Pattinson, deep into the role, compelling and charismatic as much as he’s repugnant. One can only imagine the actor on the last day of shooting, skipping the wrap party and taking a two-day soak in industrial-strength antibacterial.
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