Glen Powell runs out of road in The Running Man

Who would want to be an auteur in 2025?

The only way a filmmaker with a distinct style can get funding in 2025 is if they get various European countries to cobble together funding, a big star gets attached, or, in this instance, they remake a film with some vague cultural cache.

Edgar Wright is the latest director to serve his time in director jail after 2021’s Last Night In Soho proved there was a limit to his anarchic style over substance, homage-heavy approach to filmmaking.

The original 1987 version of The Running Man wasn’t exactly peak Arnold Schwarzenegger – it came out the same year as Predator, after all – but on paper, a director like Wright tackling an ’80s cult classic with a more modern sensibility seems like a sure bet.

In this instance, it doesn’t pay off.

In place of Arnie, real-life cowboy Glen Powell takes the mantle of The Running Man, a normal guy who is thrust into a life-or-death game show in a hyper-corporate, dystopian America (or as the history books now call it, 2025).

A guy living on the wrong side of the tracks, Powell signs up for a televised game show where contestants have to evade capture or being killed by hunters, in exchange for a life-changing amount of money.

The 1987 original was pretty flat and lifeless because, instead of a great action director like James Cameron, John McTiernan or Paul Verhoeven directing it, it was directed by Paul Michael Glaser (yes, Starsky from Starsky and Hutch).

There wasn’t an online freakout about The Running Man being remade because, frankly, the original wasn’t that great and had room for improvement.

The most interesting elements of the 1987 version were the satirical commentary on the era of Reagan-era privatisation and its commentary on how all forms of television were becoming more like a game show (or, you know, what Robocop did much better in the same year).

What seemed dystopian in 1987 is becoming our reality in 2025, and to the credit of Wright, the satirical elements of the dystopia are when the film shines and has something to say.

Wright’s version is a more faithful adaptation of the original Stephen King novel (Mr King will have a very sizeable royalty cheque this year – four films based on his works have been released in cinemas this year, along with an HBO streaming series!) and the film succeeds on those merits.

But when The Running Man actually has to be an action film? That’s when the film falls apart.

Wright’s films, namely Shaun Of The Dead, Hot Fuzz and Baby Driver, have always had a distinct sense of visual style and panache to them, but the action in The Running Man is weirdly lifeless and flat.

There’s nothing new or fresh about the action in The Running Man, and it offers nothing that you haven’t already seen done better elsewhere.

A remake of a film that starred peak Schwarzenegger should be bursting at the seams with high-octane action, but this version of The Running Man has none of the kinetic energy or spark you expect from Wright’s previous forays into action.

In the absence of interesting action, the film lives or dies on Glen Powell’s performance and credit where it’s due, he papers over the cracks with his supernova levels of charisma.

The modern era has seen a change in what we now consider a movie star – it’s not enough to just make good movies and coast on your charisma, you also have to make TV, look good on social media, work with auteurs to get smaller films made, and act as a business tycoon on the side, too.

Powell, to his credit, has always made it look easy, and this performance reaffirms what we already knew – he’s a natural movie star and is probably the heir to the Tom Cruise throne.

The rough and tumble, everyman charm of Powell has made him a favourite of college kids with Letterboxd accounts and Prosecco mothers alike.

While Tom Cruise is the obvious frame of comparison for Powell, there is another major Hollywood titan that Powell is trying to emulate here: Harrison Ford.

Like Ford before him, a lot of Powell’s charm and movie-star wattage comes from the fact that he’s traditionally handsome and looks like he knows how to fix a flat tyre.

Last year’s Twisters deployed him to great effect, but his smaller projects, such as the Richard Linklater comedy Hit Man, demonstrate he has a touch of Warren Beatty to him as well, someone who isn’t afraid to roll his sleeves up and write his own movies.

If this film is a hit, it will continue Powell’s journey to the top of the mountain, if it flops, it will only be a mere setback on the road.

The 1987 version of The Running Man had an eclectic cast, with Arnie’s fellow governor Jesse Ventura, Hogan’s Heroes star Richard Dawson and the great Yaphet Kotto acting as Arnie’s backing band.

Wright has assembled a colourful cast here; the great William H Macy pops in early on, Colman Domingo is having a ball (and steals the movie) as the show’s host, and Josh Brolin effectively deploys that shark smile he uses so well as the show’s morally crooked producer.

Domingo is one of the best actors working today – his dignified, regal performance in Sing Sing got him an Oscar nomination but wasn’t flashy enough for voters – and he is a fantastic splash of colour to add to the palette.

Brolin has become an effective go-to bad guy; while he doesn’t get in the thick of the action himself, that stern, steely-eyed grit is enough to get the blood pumping (which is a good job, because the movie’s action sure as hell doesn’t.)

Domingo hams it up as the host of The Running Man, and when the film embraces Verhoeven-style social satire, it comes close to being good.

Wright plays around with the modern social media discourse about not being able to trust everything you see on social media and how certain organisations are looking to spread an agenda.

The film is an unforgivable 2 hours and 15 minutes long; runtimes are like public restrooms insofar as you only notice them when something has gone horribly wrong, and that is certainly the case here.

If the film was a tight 90 minutes and had action scenes that didn’t have you checking your watch, that’s a film we’d recommend spending your money on to see in the cinema.

As it stands, The Running Man is a film that is both under and overdeveloped, and is a film you can wait to see on streaming instead.