At its core, The Hunt 2020 is a modern retelling of Richard Connell’s classic 1924 short story The Most Dangerous Game. A group of strangers wakes up in a clearing. They are gagged, disoriented, and quickly discover they are being hunted by a mysterious group of wealthy elites.
But where the original story was a straight-forward survival thriller, director Craig Zobel (Compliance) and writer Nick Cuse (Watchmen) inject a layer of toxic internet culture.
The "prey" are not random civilians. They are "deplorables" – specifically, working-class conservatives from "flyover country" who have been kidnapped after falling for an online conspiracy theory. Their captors are "elites" – coastal, wealthy, liberal aristocrats who have built an estate called "Manor Hill" to act out their violent fantasies against those they despise online.
The twist? The protagonist, Crystal (a career-defining performance by Betty Gilpin), refuses to play the victim. A veteran of Afghanistan, Crystal is taciturn, resourceful, and utterly unreadable. She doesn’t care about politics; she cares about survival. As the wealthy hunters pat themselves on the back for their wit and moral superiority, Crystal systematically dismantles them, one gruesome death at a time.
For all its edgy posturing, The Hunt tries to have it both ways. The hunters are clueless, wine-sipping hypocrites; the hunted are racist, gun-loving conspiracists. The film wants to mock everyone equally, but in doing so, it drains its satire of any real target. By making Crystal a centrist working-class hero who just wants to go home, the movie sidesteps the very culture war it claims to dissect. It’s safe edginess — the kind that lets liberals laugh at “deplorables” and conservatives laugh at “coastal elites” without anyone having to change their mind. The Hunt 2020
The middle third drags as the film introduces then discards supporting characters (Emma Roberts, Justin Hartley, Ike Barinholtz) in service of plot mechanics. Some of the social commentary feels dated already — the “Manorgate” scandal at the center is a thin stand-in for a certain real-world conspiracy, but the film never commits to what it actually wants to say about disinformation or class resentment.
Also, Hilary Swank is wasted. As Athena, she’s supposed to be the Queen Bee villain, but she doesn’t appear until the final act, and her performance is all sneer and no menace. The climactic monologue about her boredom with hunting “regular people” is meant to be chilling, but it lands like a first-draft Twitter thread.
The pre-release outrage — including a condemnatory tweet from Donald Trump — was wildly overblown. The Hunt is not a “liberal snuff film” targeting conservatives, nor is it a brave anti-woke manifesto. It’s a movie that mistakes cynicism for insight. The title isn’t about the literal hunt but the metaphorical one: the way Americans on both sides dehumanize each other online. But because the film refuses to take a real stance — beyond “both sides are dumb and violent” — it ends up saying nothing at all. Satire requires specificity and risk. The Hunt plays it safe by offending everyone just enough to seem daring, but never enough to be meaningful.
That said, if you turn your brain off and treat it as a black comedy action movie, it’s a blast. Betty Gilpin kicking a smug billionaire in the face is objectively satisfying. The final 15 minutes, a one-on-one brawl in a mansion’s velvet-draped living room, is a messy, cathartic delight. At its core, The Hunt 2020 is a
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The Setup (The Gag) The film opens by establishing a text message chain among a group of wealthy elites. They discuss "The Manor" and a hunt, referencing a conspiracy theory that they hunt "deplorables" for sport. The pre-release outrage — including a condemnatory tweet
The Awakening We are introduced to a group of diverse characters waking up in a forest clearing. They find a large wooden crate containing weapons and a pig. As they try to orient themselves, they are picked off one by one by hidden snipers, traps, and explosives.
The False Protagonists & The Twist The film employs a "false protagonist" narrative structure.
The Climax Crystal teams up with another survivor, Gary, and they infiltrate the elites' command post. Crystal systematically takes out the hunters using guerilla tactics. It is revealed that Gary is actually one of the hunters (Athena Stone, played by Hilary Swank) in disguise.
The Final Showdown The film culminates in a brutal, hand-to-hand fight to the death between Crystal and Athena at the elites' mansion. Crystal kills Athena, cleans herself up, takes a fancy pair of shoes, and leaves on a private jet.