A House of Dynamite will be the Kathryn Bigelow release that has remained a mystery up to now. With an October 24th release date, it’s likely to hit the Fall festivals first, per the Netflix way. Probably it gets a soft landing in Telluride, or perhaps it plays in Venice. It will be a political/military film about an “unattributed missile” about to launch at the United States. A race begins to determine who is responsible and how to respond.
I know two things about this movie without even seeing it. The first, it was written by Noah Oppenheim, so the politics will lean Left. And that means there are only two people who can be responsible for the missile. A Trump-like MAGA figure or a Putin-like dictator. And, because it’s Netflix, it can’t be anyone who is non-white doing the damage. Only one kind of villain is allowed in Hollywood in 2025 — and it’s a heterosexual white man. Occasionally a heterosexual white woman. This isn’t just a Netflix thing, it’s a Hollywood mandate.
But that will be a minor annoyance. Kathryn Bigelow is a brilliant filmmaker whose two best films revolve around the military. The masterpiece The Hurt Locker, which won Best Picture in 2009, and Zero Dark Thirty, which should have won Best Picture in 2012 but was punished because of the information about the CIA and its torture program. Bigelow was accused of making it seem like the torture program had led to the capture and kill of Osama Bin Laden, the mastermind of 9/11.
Zero Dark Thirty is a tense thriller with a strong performance by Jessica Chastain, not to mention Bigelow’s ease of filming male soldiers — a true gift. Bigelow took an even bigger hit in 2017 with Detroit, as she was accused of exploiting violence of Black bodies. As a white woman, she was not authorized to tell this story. Some filmmmakers are allowed to tell stories outside their racial category (Martin Scorsese) and some aren’t. She was hit hard in the press and the Bigelow story quieted down. Now, eight years later, she’s back.
Bigelow is in her comfort zone with this film, which, like Zero Dark Thirty, is driven by strong female lead. In this case, it’s Rebecca Ferguson who does not get top billing because Idris Elba does. Is he the President of the United States? The head of the Department of Defense? The cast is revealed on IMDb, but not the character names.
A House of Dynamite is the third installment of her military trilogy. If it is even half as good as either of them, it will be among the best films of the year.
Logline | When a single, unattributed missile is launched at the
United States, a race begins to determine who is responsible and
how to respond.
A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE
Directed By: Kathryn Bigelow
Written By: Noah Oppenheim
Produced By: Greg Shapiro, p.g.a., Kathryn Bigelow, p.g.a., Noah Oppenheim, p.g.a.
Executive Producers: Brian Bell, Sarah Bremner
Director of Photography: Barry Ackroyd, BSC
Production Designer: Jeremy Hindle
Costume Designer: Sarah Edwards
Editor: Kirk Baxter, A.C.E.
Music By: Volker Bertelmann
Sound Design By: Paul N. J. Ottosson
Co-Producers: Jeremy Hindle, Sumaiya Kaveh
Casting By: Susanne Scheel
Cast: Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Anthony Ramos, Moses Ingram, Jonah Hauer-King, with Greta Lee, and Jason Clarke. Also starring Malachi Beasley, Brian Tee, Brittany O’Grady, Gbenga Akinnagbe, Willa Fitzgerald, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Kyle Allen, Kaitlyn Dever.
