LATIMES.COM/CALENDAR FRIDAY, MARCH 13, 2020E9
Get these 6
amazing wines!
$
29.95
Just
Valued over
$120.00
Over 1000 Total Awards
Platinum, Gold and 90+ points.
60% OffRetail Value
Nocommitments.
Nohidden fees.
Nospecial terms and conditions.
Personalized Selections
from the #1Awarded
Wine Club in America
FREE
Shipping
Getyour6amazingwinesat:
LATimesWine.com/cork
Love your wines or get your money back, GUARANTEED.
AT THE MOVIES
a satire, “The Hunt” does not
even play fair in terms of the
humans hunting humans
theme that began in film with
1932’s “The Most Dangerous
Game,” which shared some
cast, crew and RKO sets with
the legendary “King Kong.”
Attempting to offend no
one on either side (hey, it’s all
about the Benjamins), the
pretend class warfare story-
line actually flees from the
notion of people being
hunted down because of their
political beliefs: When push
comes to shove (spoiler alert)
the hunters are given a spe-
cific personal revenge motive
for their actions.
Bowing to no one in its de-
termination to bring com-
forting caricatures to the
screen, “The Hunt’s” proper
action (following an enig-
matic exchange of Tweets)
begins on a private jet filled
with snobbish, arrogant
elites making snide com-
ments about caviar and
Champagne.
After a brief but ghoulish
interlude (a harbinger of the
film’s relentless passion for
Grand Guignol style gore) in-
volving a stiletto heel (use
your imagination), “The
Hunt” gets down to business
in a deceptively green and
tranquil rural area.
There a nondescript
group of a dozen people
awake from sleep (it turns
out they’ve been drugged in
various parts of the U.S.) tofind themselves with locked
gags on their mouths. Keys to
these soon materialize, as do
a wide variety of weapons,
and then all hell breaks out.
Unseen assailants strafe
these folks with automatic
weapons fire, bombard them
with arrows and place deadly
booby traps in their paths.
Don’t get too attached to
anyone you see, “The Hunt”
is one of those movies that
thinks it’s hip to kill off any-
one we form the slightest at-
tachment to.
Gradually it becomes
clear — and not just because
one hefty individual wears an
“Airborn” cap — that these
folks all share a red state
point of view.
It’s their language thatgives them away, as Cuse and
Lindelof ’s script name-
checks everything from the
concepts of stand your
ground, deep state and crisis
actors to the Fox News
broadcasts of Sean Hannity.
More than that, several of
these folks have heard of a
shadowy scandal called Man-
orgate, wherein wealthy libe-rals hunt down “deplorables”
for sport. Hmm....
Once we spend quality
time with members of “The
Hunt’s” elite, led by the aptly
named Athena (Hilary
Swank), they turn out to be
way more moronic and insuf-
ferable than the red staters,
boasting of Ava DuVernay lik-
ing one of their social media
posts and being overly con-
cerned with politically cor-
rect language.
Fortunately, there turns
out to be one person in the
film that a desperate audi-
ence can attach itself to, and
that would be the intrepid
Crystal (Betty Gilpin, Emmy
nominated for Netflix’s
“Glow”).
A Mississippi native withthe accent to prove it, Crystal
is part of the red state group,
but she is so determinedly
nonpolitical she insists on it
twice (just in case the audi-
ence missed it the first time
around). More combat ready
than a squad of Navy SEALs,
Crystal is all about survival.
If you think this film is
headed for a showdown be-
tween Athena and Crystal,
you get an exploitation film
gold medal with a Roger Cor-
man cluster. Little is unex-
pected in “The Hunt,” includ-
ing its reminder — as if we
needed reminding — of the
notion attributed to H.L.
Mencken that “nobody ever
went broke underestimating
the intelligence of the Ameri-
can people.” Indeed.‘The Hunt’ steeped in controversy
[‘Hunt,’from E1]
JUSTIN HARTLEYand Sylvia Grace Crim in “The Hunt,” which was postponed from September. The studio has since crafted a crackerjack marketing campaign.
Universal Pictures‘The Hunt’
Rated:R, for strong bloody
violence and language
throughout
Running time:1 hour,
30 minutes
Playing:In general release