"Run, Hide, Fight"

Seeking to compete against the left-leaning movie industry, conservative media outlet, The Daily Wire, recently released its premier feature film, "Run, Hide, Fight." This movie is Rated TV-MA with very good reason. If extreme violence, cruelty, foul language, and suspense are not your style (as they are not mine), I encourage (and implore) you to steer clear of the movie, and maybe even this review. As a Daily Wire subscriber, I decided to watch the movie. I almost turned it off 30 minutes in, but I managed to stick it out through the whole film. The Daily Wire describes the movie:

All Zoe Hull wants is to get through the last few weeks of her senior year and leave — off to college and a fresh start. Instead, her high school is attacked by four nihilistic, gun-toting students, who plan to make their siege the worst school shooting in history.

As is obvious from the description, the movie is filled with such depth of depravity that it is extremely difficult for me to say it was a good movie. The special effects were convincingly grotesque. The camera does not spare you the dark details of the antagonists' horrible actions. As I said, I do not usually watch movies like this. I could probably count on one hand (certainly on two) the number of R rated films I have seen. Of those films that I recall, the only film that comes close to the sheer repulsiveness of this would be the opening sequence of "Bird Box" in which afflicted people are compelled to commit suicide in the most shocking ways imaginable. However, the sheer realism of the situations in "Run, Hide, Fight" make it even more disturbing and shocking.

Perhaps the most disturbing thing (besides the visuals) was the amount of detail put into describing the plan of the villains. Their strategy for attacking the school was meticulously shown in a way that is genuinely scary to me as a teacher. My fear is that it would inspire "copycat" events that use the advanced tactics shown in the movie. I don't think the movie should be censored, or boycotted, but I can only pray that events like those in this movie never take place in the real world. I am glad that the movie is only accessible behind a paywall at Daily Wire.

As I said, it's extremely hard for me to say this is a good movie, but it certainly had good aspects. The lead actress, Isabelle May, was great. You may recognize her from the more family friendly Netflix series "Alexa and Katie." The writing for her character, and her acting were great. The quality of filming and editing were great, although (as said above) sickening.

Despite its openly conservative producers, the message of the film was not particularly “conservative.” Other than its use of guns as a part of the rescue, and a short highlight of the faith of one student, the movie was fairly apolitical. In my opinion, the message was so hidden behind the depravity, it kind of got covered up. If there was a message, it’s that schools need a lot better preparation, communication, and protection. At least that was my takeaway.

The TL;DR is that I can't in good conscience recommend the film to anyone. It is a quality film with a compelling story, but the depravity within cannot be overstated.

5/10