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Parents' Guide to

Run with the Hunted

By Jeffrey M. Anderson, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 16+

Well-acted but violent, uneven crime drama about runaways.

Movie NR 2020 93 minutes
Run with the Hunted Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

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What's the Story?

In RUN WITH THE HUNTED, young Oscar (Mitchell Paulsen) is sent by his mother to bring a plate of food to the neighbors: a little girl named Loux (Madilyn Kellam) and her younger brother, Amos (Evan Assante), who live with their drunken, abusive father. Oscar decides to commit an act of violence to save the younger children, and then runs away to the big city. There he meets a girl of about the same age named Peaches (Kylie Rogers) and falls in with a gang of lost children who are trained by Birdie (Ron Perlman) and Sway (Mark Boone Junior) to become thieves and pickpockets. Fifteen years later, the grown Oscar (Michael Pitt) and Peaches (Dree Hemingway) are in charge of a new group of kids, while Loux (Sam Quartin) gets a job for a private eye (Isiah Whitlock Jr.) and uses her new resources to try to find her old friend.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say: Not yet rated
Kids say: Not yet rated

Taking inspiration from Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist, this crime drama offers a few powerful moments and strong performances, but it suffers from a general lack of logic and emotional honesty. Run with the Hunted starts well, as Oscar's father, played by William Forsythe, gives him advice about helping others. Then things take a wrong turn as young Oscar decides to take violent action rather than speak to his parents about Loux and Amos' abuse. Moreover, the grown-up Loux and her brother don't seem to have any problem with what Oscar did, seeming to view him as some kind of savior. Wouldn't life be a little more complex?

It's as if the movie dictated that all of its characters have only one single choice, designed to move the plot forward, with no other possible choices available to complicate matters. Just about everything feels slightly disconnected. In transferring Dickens' 1838 novel story to the contemporary screen, writer-director John Swab doesn't seem to have asked how modern times might impact this kind of criminal scheme. Despite fine performances by Forsythe, Perlman, and Mark Boone Junior as the "Fagin" figures and Whitlock Jr. as a private eye, the movie doesn't quite click. Perhaps if Run with the Hunted had captured a genuine sense of being lost, it might have felt more moving.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about Run with the Hunted's violence. How did it make you feel? How much is actually shown? Is it designed to be shocking or thrilling? What's the impact of media violence on kids?

  • What other choices could Oscar have made when he found out about his neighbors' abusive father?

  • What goes wrong in the scene in which Peaches handles a gun? Could this incident have been avoided?

  • Why do you think people choose to tell stories about children in peril? Does it make sense that some of the kids who are in the movie aren't old enough to actually see the movie?

  • How does this story compare to Oliver Twist? How does it translate to the modern age?

Movie Details

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