As a volunteer of Glasgow Film Festival this year, I’ve had the honour of watching the Scottish premieres of many films, from Jim Jarmusch’s latest film Father Mother Sister Brother (2025), Willem Dafoe as a mafia boss in The Birthday Party (2025), to the anti-war Truman Show-esque film Atropia (2025). However, the one that stuck out to me the most was Dead Man’s Wire, directed by Gus Van Sant—best known for Good Will Hunting (1997) and My Own Private Idaho (1991)—and starring Bill Skarsgård, Colman Domingo, and Al Pacino.
Dead Man’s Wire is based on a ridiculously dramatic real-life story in the 1970s, where a man at his wits’ end decided to hold his mortgage broker hostage and negotiate for immunity and financial compensation. The film is one long anxiety-inducing sequence spanning three days, complemented by comedic moments that break and build tension. The story is largely reminiscent of Dog Day Afternoon (1975), although this time, Al Pacino plays the antagonist instead of the social justice warrior. Both touch on the spontaneity and unexpected humour of high-stakes situations, presenting the protagonists empathetically as normal people who are just as shocked about the crimes they’re committing as the audience. Taking inspiration from Do the Right Thing (1989), Colman Domingo’s sexy radio voice is impossible to ignore, situating the film in the socio-political climate of Indianapolis.
Overall, Dead Man’s Wire is a stunning character study of small-town people living the disillusionment of the American Dream, searching for meaning in drastically different ways. Under the guise of a hostage and heist story, the film chooses to tackle the humanity of it all, where each character comes to some sort of revelation, or is resolved in the fact that the answer they seek may never come at all.
Photo by Rock Staar on Unsplash.