‘Primetime’ – the first US programme to take on the monster that is television

To Catch a Predator was a controversial television programme, broadcast on NBC from 2004 to 2007, with an average audience of around 7 million viewers per episode, peaking at 10 million. It was presented by journalist and newsreader Chris Hansen, who exposed sex offenders – particularly paedophiles – live on television after they had been lured by undercover police officers via the internet. A television adaptation of Marco Bellocchio’s 1972 film Sbatti il mostro in prima pagina: except that here the medium is television and the investigations leave no room for fabrication: they are conducted by the police. The ‘decoy’ would arrange a meeting at a house; a young actor or actress with a childlike voice, dressed and made up to look like a minor, would open the door and pretend to have to step out for a moment. Then Hansen would appear, with the cameras rolling, for a confrontation with the predator; after which the police would intervene. It was one of the greatest phenomena in pop culture, halfway between an investigation, a public service programme, voyeurism, morbid fascination and a media witch-hunt that even targeted family members. Lance Oppenheim has made a film about it, *i* *Primetime* , in cinemas from 15 October, in competition at Venice, with Robert Pattinson in the role of the presenter.

The film takes us back decades in terms of its cinematic aesthetic too, adapted to television and the fashion of the time, and it is quite surprising that it is a thirty-year-old, like Oppenheim – a documentary-maker making his first feature-length fiction film – should look to that world and that directing style. But it is even more interesting to reflect on the fact that Oppenheim arrived at To Catch a Predator without ever having watched television, an almost prehistoric artefact for Millennials. ‘I first came across the programme through the parodies of it on *South Park* – the satirical animated comedy, very popular amongst young people, ed. –. I’d never actually watched the show. Chris Hansen was hugely popular: he wasn’t just a television personality, but a veritable mythological creature with a special, almost supernatural charisma. He had the power to dismantle a person’s life simply by saying: ‘What are you doing here?’” This was, in fact, the phrase Hansen used when he burst into the meeting place, which was being filmed by hidden cameras.

“I remember,” continues the director, “that as a child I really loved Scarface and Chris Hansen reminded me of Tony Montana. Child grooming – the psychological manipulation of a minor to establish a relationship of trust and dependence with a view to sexually abusing or exploiting them editor’s note – is a very serious issue, one of the greatest problems of our time. Hansen used it to achieve success; he turned it into a commercial phenomenon, a circus or carnival-like spectacle, but at the same time he sent several perpetrators to prison. The theatrical manner in which he presented the programme both revolted and intrigued me. I kept thinking about it and asking myself a question: what goes on in the mind of someone who spends all day in a dark world and finds themselves in contact with deeply disturbed people? What happens when you mix news and entertainment, rhetoric and drama? And what happens to you when you go home and are no longer the most powerful person in the world?’

Among the film’s producers, alongside Pattinson, is Ari Aster, one of the most avant-garde and original directors of the new wave of American cinema. The production trio is an interesting one: in his films, Aster blends horror, black humour and explicit violence; Pattinson, meanwhile, grew up in the vampire-themed spectacle of Twilight, a franchise he is trying to shake off. Pattinson and Aster belong to Generation Y, whilst Oppenheim belongs to the next generation, accustomed to the violence of video games. ‘I looked up Hansen on YouTube and when I watched the programme, rather than being disturbed by the subject matter, I was quite captivated by Hansen’s power, as he saved children like a superhero. I was captivated by his physicality, his voice, the way he looked into the camera. Pattinson is brilliant at portraying Hansen’s television swagger and his private fragility.”

Originally from Florida and a Harvard graduate, Oppenheim began directing short documentary films whilst still at secondary school, which he would send to the *New York Times* – such as the one about ‘crazy things that happen in my back garden’ – but they were always rejected. His subsequent works have focused on the ‘strange but true’, highlighting, through the bizarre, the trends of contemporary Western society (including its distortions and paradoxes), such as Some Kind of Heaven (2020) on The Villages, in Florida, the world’s largest retirement community (minimum age 55); Spermworld (2024), on unregulated sperm donation, and You Can See Everything, which he co-directed with Nathan Fielder, about Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of the healthcare technology company Theranos, who was convicted of defrauding investors. He also directed the HBO documentary series *Ren Faire* (2024), about the Texas Renaissance Festival, the largest Renaissance-themed fair and theme park in the United States. The theme of limits and thresholds, therefore, was present in his documentaries even before *Primetime*. ‘I like to call the documentaries I’ve directed “docu-fantasy”, because I grapple with the hopes, dreams and struggles of real people, translating them into the language of cinema and, in effect, transforming human stories and dramas into Hollywood material. In Primetime, I sought to use the language of Douglas Sirk – a master of Hollywood melodrama, who, through seemingly superficial and tear-jerking stories, fiercely criticised American society in the 1950s [editor’s note] –. I tried to take Close-Up by Abbas Kiarostami – a film that redefined the boundaries between fiction and documentary [ed.] – as a point of reference. Chris Hansen trained the actors, who were working on To Catch a Predator, to become something other than themselves for a very noble cause. And at the same time, to turn them into a media tool. He created fake homes featuring everyday foods such as pizza, crisps and sweets – elements that clashed with the very serious and dangerous issue of paedophilia, which involved deeply disturbed individuals ready to commit terrible acts. The programme was a perfect blend of truth and fiction, imbued with a profound sense of humanity, mixed with a certain light-heartedness that Hansen brought through his humour. I realised that his character has followed me through every film I’ve made to date. For me, Hansen isn’t just a journalist or a comedian, but also an artist. His humour turns him into a meme of himself. After the programme ended, I asked myself: ‘What ever happened to him?’”