The Runner Review: Gal Gadot’s Thriller Is the Cinematic Equivalent of a Good Run Spoiled

You have seen a movie like the new Gal Gadot vehicle, The Runner, thousands of times before. The film visually grabs your attention, but the plot points are inane, the dialogue is overloaded with exposition, and the star struggles to convey basic human emotions like fear, desperation, and panic to create true stakes, unpredictability, and escalation.

Ultimately, despite all the slick visuals, the script cannot outrun its predictability, making The Runner the cinematic equivalent of a good run spoiled.

The story follows Maia Marten (Wonder Woman’s Gal Gadot), a London-based attorney and single mother raising her son, Noah (Rory Wilmot of the upcoming Harry Potter series), on her own. Maia is one of those disciplined professionals, always dropping her son off at school right before her morning run. For the first time, she lets Noah walk the final few yards to school alone.

What is Prime Video’s The Runner about?

A choice that Maia will soon regret. Trying to clear her head before a big case, she is defending a local scumbag, Tafa (Spider-Man: Brand New Day’s Phoenix Di Sebastiani), who has apparently pissed off a criminal who actually matters. That’s when Maia takes a call from a mysterious man who tells her he has Noah and, if she doesn’t follow his instructions, her son will die.

We only know the man as “the Caller” (Band of Brothers’ Damien Lewis, doing everything he can to hide the fact that he’s in this movie), and he’s given Maia’s son an extra shot of insulin, turning Noah’s condition into a medical emergency. He tells Maia that she must kill Tafa within 90 minutes, or the Caller will kill her son, leading to a race against time to save Noah’s life.

The Runner comes from Academy Award winner Kevin Macdonald, which should inspire confidence, given his mastery of documentaries like Touching the Void, Marley, and Whitney. And that’s before getting to feature films like The Last King of Scotland and the stunning political thriller State of Play. He’s versatile, has an eye for immediacy, and understands momentum.

Prime Video’s The Runner Review

All of these qualities should help in a thriller where the main character is constantly on the move. What had me excited initially was Kevin Macdonald‘s understanding of morally complicated characters. That gave me hope that this attempt at a genre film would bring a twist of unpredictability and take a walk on the wild side of convention, with bold choices.

Sadly, the script was by Mark Gibson, who hasn’t written a feature film in nearly twenty years. Before that, he specialized in family films that bombed, like Snow Dogs and The Wild. You can predict almost everything that follows the standard against time playbook, step by step. That’s fine if it’s smart, but it pulls a fast one, and you hear the same boilerplate exposition all the time.

For example, the film does not ring true. The villain has Maia’s child, yet she makes excuses for why she cannot reach the target. He has your child, so you’re not going to argue. Even if Gibson sticks to the conventional plot point, why not at least make the back-and-forth entertaining? The Caller could say, “Oh, well, since there is no need to keep Noah alive, I’ll kill him now.”

Is Prime Video’s The Runner worth watching?

Choices like this would add tension and make the dialogue darkly entertaining. Not to mention, why not let Maia make a morally indefensible choice and embrace the ethical damnation that comes with it? It’s the same ending we’ve seen thousands of times, so why not make the bold choice? Saving the idea for a sequel?

Instead, Macdonald pulls the film back to cinematic safety.

Going there would certainly make the film stand out against all the generic streaming fare. Instead, Prime Video makes the safe choice, which I’m sure some viewers will enjoy, especially those taken in by the red herrings, filler plot points, and repetitive cinematography. But it’s all smoke and mirrors covering up the fact that this is essentially a CBS procedural premise stretched into a 90-minute movie.

You can stream The Runner exclusively on Prime Video starting September 2nd!

The Runner Review: Gal Gadot’s Thriller Is the Cinematic Equivalent of a Good Run Spoiled