Primetime director Lance Oppenheim was born in 1996. He’s grown up in a world of artificial YouTubers pretending to be “normal”. He was just a few years old when Survivor and American Idol defined what 21st-century television looked like. He’s witnessed firsthand social media algorithms contorting everyone’s definition of reality. No wonder stories about reality and fiction messily intersecting fascinate him.

His 2020 documentary Some Kind of Heaven saw gritty human foibles intruding on an “idyllic” Florida retirement community. Meanwhile, his 2024 HBO documentary miniseries Ren Faire mesmerizingly examined people scrambling for hierarchical power at the titular Texas-based location. A realm of medieval-era facsimiles was the perfect backdrop to explore what people will endure for just a morsel of authority.

Now Oppenheim has leaped into narrative films without abandoning his fixation on reality and fantasy colliding. What better place to explore that fascination than 2000s reality TV?

Not just any 2000s reality TV, though. This isn’t a film about Fear Factor or The Biggest Loser. Instead, Primetime is about To Catch a Predator, a Dateline NBC program where Chris Hansen (Robert Pattinson) hosted sting operations to catch adults wanting to have sex with minors. As Primetime begins, Hansen’s show is skyrocketing in popularity. NBC head Jeff Zucker even informs him and the program’s producer, Andie Bender (Merritt Wever), that they’re putting Predator in a primetime scheduling slot. They’ll be competing directly against Lost. No pressure.

Hansen’s more determined than ever to crank up the spectacle on To Catch a Predator. With new actor Dan Plumb (Skyler Gisondo) in tow, Hansen and his team hanker for major targets to capture on film. Obsession already defines this man’s life. Now, though, that quality is becoming even more inescapable. No wonder Plumb and Bender are starting to have second thoughts about working here.

Primetime’s incredibly audacious and transfixing just on a visual level alone. Part of that comes from how multi-faceted these images are. Director Lance Oppenheim and cinematographer David Bolen evoke Robby Müller’s To Live and Die in L.A.’s cinematography in Primetime through imbuing every scene with bright lights and equally vibrant green/red hues. But that’s not all! There’s also a deluge of horror movie-inspired imagery. Much of these shots involving Hansen’s eyes poking out from around the corner or peering through holes in the walls.

Then there are the uber-specific aspect ratios (1.50:1 with occasional digressions into 1.33:1 framing) and deeply pixelated visuals. The latter element especially echoes the photography of 2000s reality TV programming captured on digital camcorders. There are even sharp visual comedy instincts (namely how nothing’s funnier than unspoken jokes or sight gags playing out in the background unrelated to the foreground) littered throughout. Primetime is a deeply specific and potently realized filmmaking smorgasbord. The visual unpredictability perfectly mirrors both Hansen’s chaotic personality and the film’s anxiety-inducing ambiance.

Primetime even establishes its idiosyncratic imagery impulses right away. This title begins with Hansen in his dressing room. The man is captured in deeply pixelated, tight close-ups. It’s an image imploring viewers to wonder, “what am I looking at?” That uncertainty permeates a story laying bare reality TV’s innate exploitation and creepiness. After all, as David Ehlrich remarked in his review of the 2025 documentary Predators (which also dealt with To Catch a Predator), “It’s perverse that a TV news program about child predators quickly developed its own catchphrase.”

As depicted in Primetime, Hansen’s Messiah complex and a craving for the world to bend to his will drive everything. When To Catch a Predator performer Del Harvey (Phoebe Bridgers) expresses (correct) discomfort over official and creepy To Catch a Predator thong merchandise, Hansen doesn’t blink. What really gets his goat? Lost’s most recent plot twists overshadowing his work. Ditto not getting to do an infinite number of takes for his voice-over narration. The same “profits and success above all else” mentality fueling dehumanizing 2000s reality TV show nightmares like Kid Nation or The Briefcase receives a human form with this version of Chris Hansen.

Performing this role, Robert Pattinson is nothing short of extraordinary. Anyone who’s followed his exemplary, gung-ho work over the last 15-ish years (in Good Time, The Lighthouse, The Odyssey, and so many other titles) won’t be surprised that he’s exceptional portraying Hansen. However, like the best actors, Pattinson finds ways to surprise even people used to his artistry. His chilling portrayal of Hansen as an Elizabeth Holmes/Todd Alquist-type (a human being struggling to act like a human being) is so eerie.

His persistently intense face alone makes even dialogue-free moments with Pattinson memorable. This actor’s manifestation of deeply externalized, “kooky” Chris Hansen behavior always comes off as purposeful rather than distractingly showy. Best of all, Pattinson’s Primetime performance works on its own merits. He’s not good solely because he mimics Chris Hansen perfectly (though he does do that too). If someone had never seen Hansen before Primetime, this performance would still register as special and so meticulously executed. Like the greatest portrayals of real-life people, Pattinson makes this turn stand on its own two feet.

In the cast, though, Skyler Gisondo’s earnest and aching tragic performance is remarkable. An early scene where he portrays Dan excitedly reacting to banal hotel amenities (“they’ve got towels!”) effectively establishes this character as a sheltered soul about to experience Hell. Watching Gisondo so excellently portray that descent one of Primetime’s greatest assets.

The same is true for Merritt Weaver as this film’s equivalent to Ren Faire’s Jeffrey Baldwin; a person closely tied to a powerful figure aware that this world’s rotten. However, Baldwin and Bender are incapable of leaving these tortured confines. They always return, drawn like a moth to a flame. Weaver’s riveting manifestation of that personality is engrossing, especially since this performer commits to some truly unforgettable line deliveries (particularly in one scene where Bender implores Hansen to get off a kitchen floor).

These and other standout Primetime actors (like Bokeem Woodbine and Matthew Maher) soar because Oppenheim infuses this movie with an outsized aesthetic befitting its subject matter. You know how certain boundary-pushing musicians (like Bob Marley) get their lives translated into rote music biopics? Thankfully, Oppenheim hasn’t translated 2000s reality TV madness into a stodgy feature. Instead, he’s crafted a loopy, haunting enterprise perfectly capturing the madness of cops eschewing protocol or defining your existence by beating out Lost in Nielsen viewership.

Primetime leaves your brain swirled and pulse pounding. It’s tremendously well crafted, right down to Ari Balouzian’s intentionally and compelling dissonant score (which sounds like it could’ve hailed from a Douglas Sirk movie). Entered this world in January 1996, Lance Oppenheim’s existence has never been devoid of exploitative and squirm-inducing reality TV programming. Pervasiveness, though, clearly hasn’t erased the seediness of such productions from Oppenheim’s gaze. Just look at what he explores throughout Primetime, which somehow offers even more than unforgettable Pattinson, Gisondo, and Weaver performances.

Primetime is in theaters everywhere on September 25.