The season of Skarsgards continues with Dead Man’s Wire, a Gus Van Sant-directed dramedy based on a dark true story from 1977, which showcases a terrific performance by Bill Skarsgard (It) as a Luigi Mangione-like figure. The timely film had its North American premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival’s Princess of Wales Theatre on Sunday — having world premiered last week at the Venice Film Festival, where it received a rave from THR — and went over extremely well. It is still seeking U.S. distribution, but will surely soon find it, and when it does, assuming it is released this year, it could thrust Skarsgard into the thick of an Oscar race that already includes his father Stellan (for a supporting performance Neon’s Sentimental Value) and brother Alexander (for a leading turn in A24’s Pillion).
Dead Man’s Wire, the first produced feature scripted by Austin Kolodney, centers on Tony Kiritzis, an Indianapolis man who poured his life savings into a real estate investment, the sale of which, he felt, was then deliberately sabotaged by his mortgage broker, thrusting him into a rage. He showed up at the office of the mortgage company, seeking its CEO M.L. Hall (Al Pacino), but, upon learning that the man was on vacation, met up with the man’s son Richard Hall (Dacre Montgomery), the company’s president, and took him hostage. Kiritzis connected a sawed-off shotgun to a wire that he placed around Hall’s neck, and, in full view of the police and media, transported him back to his own apartment, from which negotiations commenced. As twisted as Kiritzis’ behavior was, he became something of a folk hero after sharing his motives via interviews with a popular local DJ (Colman Domingo).
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Watching the film, one cannot help but think of Sidney Lumet’s 1975 classic Dog Day Afternoon (underscored by the presence of Pacino in both films) and Mangione, the man who assassinated a health care executive in cold blood late last year but retained support from much of the public. Resentment of the rich by the poor dates back to the beginning of time, but it is clearly spiking at the moment, as evident in everything from the popularity of Donald Trump (ironically), Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to another 2025 film about the abduction of a powerful corporate titan, Yorgos Lanthimos’ Bugonia.
Dead Man’s Wire, which was shot in just 19 days, is clearly a low-budget film, so I imagine its asking price won’t be terribly high. A distributor who would like to have an instant best actor Oscar contender would be wise to snap it up. Van Sant, one of the great actors’ directors of his time, has directed several prior performances that went on to not only Oscar noms, but wins (Robin Williams in 1997’s Good Will Hunting and Sean Penn in 2008’s Milk), and he’s in fine form on this one.
