Dead Man’s Wire

Gus Van Sant’s taut new film chronicles the events surrounding a 1977 hostage situation that became a media sensation.

  • Director

    Gus Van Sant

  • With

    Bill Skarsgård, Dacre Montgomery, Colman Domingo, Al Pacino

  • USA 2025. 104min

  • Digital

  • Certificate

    15

  • A Vertigo release

The director of To Die For, Good Will Hunting and Elephant delivers a gripping thriller based on the real-life kidnapping of a mortgage broker. In 1977, Tony Kiritsis, a struggling and socially awkward Indianapolis businessman, enters the offices of the mortgage company he believes swindled him out of a potentially lucrative land deal. Armed with a sawn-off shotgun attached to a dead man’s switch – a wire placed around a target’s neck – he demands $5 million and a personal apology from the company’s CEO. The spirit of Sidney Lumet’s Dog Day Afternoon permeates this brilliantly suspenseful and wildly entertaining crime thriller – even down to Al Pacino’s scene-stealing cameo. In a film charged with a manic energy and a claustrophobic air, punctuated with sly humour and a fantastic soundtrack, Bill Skarsgård brings a combination of erratic intensity and vulnerability, conveying Tony’s desperation. While the film successfully recreates the dawn of an era when unfettered capitalism tightened its stranglehold on everyday American life.

Kimberley Sheehan, Lead Programmer