The Daily Wire, the conservative podcast and news/opinion website, has entered the Hollywood arena to compete in the culture war by producing Run Hide Fight, directed by Kyle Rankin. Run Hide Fight is a thriller that features Isabel May as Zoe Hull, the film’s protagonist, who fights to protect her fellow students against a gang of teenagers attacking their school. Thomas Jane, who also starred in the 2004 film Punisher, plays Zoe’s father who has taught his daughter everything she knows about survival, honing her protective instincts.
Many critics of the film feel as though Rankin made this thriller in a “fundamentally tasteless” manner and that it comes off as “shallow” while attempting to take advantage of the country and immediate victims’ pain over school violence. The Daily Wire’s John Bickley defended the film by saying it’s not a psychological deep-dive into the minds of school attackers but rather highlighting conservative values and heroes in dark situations. “[Hollywood continues to] undermine the very values that have made this country exceptional,” notes Ben Shapiro, Daily Wire podcast host and one of the film’s financial backers.
Most recently, a real-life example of heroism during one of these tragedies was Junior ROTC cadet Colton Haab during the attack on Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida on February 14th, 2018. Haab ushered 60 to 70 of his classmates, shielding them with the marksmanship club’s kevlar when he heard shots fired. Despite his heroism, the mainstream media instead chose to highlight anti-gun activist students (many of whom were not in the building during the event) and bombard Dana Loesch and Senator Marco Rubio at a CNN Town Hall.
Professional critics, specifically those on the Rotten Tomatoes staff, give better ratings to films with socially progressive themes compared to those that find themselves in politically-charged controversy, as Run Hide Fight does, according to research done by a “diehard moderate” blogger “Center is Sexy”. “It’s not that the general audience doesn’t want to see films that deal with gender identity and race. It’s that they can tell when a rating is artificially inflated; when the plot isn’t all the way there; when it’s more preachy than it is narratively evocative,” they explain in their article.
Despite left-leaning biased criticism against the film, some believe Run Hide Fight is a genuinely suspenseful thriller akin to Die Hard but set in a high school instead of Nakatomi Plaza. Teachers have even taken to YouTube to give their praise of the film.
Conservative Rob Smith recently tweeted, “The left owns: Hollywood, Art, Fashion, Movies, Music, TV. They’re winning the culture war. And it’s time for conservatives to at least show up to battle.”
Audience reviews for the film stay optimistically high despite negative reviews from left-leaning publications/authors. The Daily Wire has not made the profit margins of the film public, but from the growing confidence of the team since the movie’s release, one can only assume the film has been a success thus far.
Audiences can stream Run Hide Fight now when they subscribe to The Daily Wire’s Insider or All Access membership accounts.
