A House of Dynamite receives 11-minute standing ovation in Venice and scores 92% on Rotten Tomatoes
According to CinemaDrame News Agency, A House of Dynamite, directed by Academy Award winner Kathryn Bigelow, received an 11-minute standing ovation at the Venice Film Festival along with glowing reviews. The film currently holds a 92% score on Rotten Tomatoes and an 88% on Metacritic.
The film portrays the U.S. response to a missile attack, with Idris Elba starring as the President. The screenplay was written by Noah Oppenheim, former NBC News executive and writer of Jackie. The cast also includes Greta Lee, Rebecca Ferguson, Anthony Ramos, Kaitlyn Dever, Tracy Letts, Jason Clarke, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Moses Ingram, Brian Tee, and Kyle Allen.
A Guardian critic awarded the film a full five stars, writing: “I watched this film with a severe pallor, but also with that strange, mounting nausea that only this subject matter can evoke.”
The Hollywood Reporter wrote: “Eight years after her last feature, Kathryn Bigelow returns with a breathless, relentless thriller—so meticulously controlled, so kinetic, so disturbingly immersive—that by the end you wonder if the world is still in one piece.”
A critic from The Wrap noted: “The film has its twists and resets, feeding the audience more information while surprising them. It can be exhilarating and at times repetitive, but it fulfills its mission: it throws you into the middle of a crisis and keeps you there.”
The Playlist praised Oppenheim’s screenplay: “He deepens that pit of dread by rapidly layering events and information.”
A BBC critic wrote: “More thrilling than most thrillers, and more horrifying than most horror films.”
The Telegraph awarded the film four out of five stars, writing: “The initial survey of the crisis inside the White House Situation Room may feel a little dry. But as events rely on different angles, the continuous expansion of context escalates the tension dramatically. Very quickly we find ourselves as lost as Elba’s President, trapped in a chain of events that inevitably creates obstacles, leaving us restless and searching for a clear answer.”
The Independent wrote: “Screening in competition at Venice, A House of Dynamite is a timely and grim warning about the renewed dangers of nuclear escalation. But another way of looking at it is as the most entertaining Hollywood movie about potential mass slaughter since Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove.”
