Run Hide Fight - A Pretty Enjoyable Action Thriller Movie of High School Taken Hostage by A Group of Students

I was delightfully surprised to see this movie going to be released in the month of April in Catchplay+, cause I remember that the film was playing in one of Indonesia's cinema chain only a couple of months ago. But since we were having the third wave of the pandemic, we did not dare go to the theaters then. Anyway it was quite nice as the movie could be watched without additional fee. So let's get right to it now.

Brief Story Line

A 17 year old high school student named Jennifer Hull (Isabel May - Alexa & Katie TV series etc) was having constrained relationship with her father (Thomas Jane - Before I Wake, AXL etc) and dealing with the memory of her mother (Radha Mitchell - London Has Fallen, Phone Booth etc). She was looking forward to be graduated soon and was only managing her remaining days with her best friend Lewis (Olly Sholotan - Bel-Air TV series etc).

However, what started as a standard day at school became chaotic when a group of students led by Tristan Voy (Eli Brown - Gossip Girl 2021 TV series etc) came to school and started shooting off students and held some of them hostage. The local sheriff Tarsy (Treat Williams - Prince of the City, Everwood TV series etc) had to deal with this dangerous situation only with the help from Jennifer who was fortunate enough not captured by Tristan's friends.

So how would the story conclude? Find them all in this action thriller movie.

End of Brief Story Line

Well this movie had a start which felt unconventional and having a bit of twist. Then it continued with a pretty standard introduction of the characters which took a while to get to the really interesting part. But once it began, it was pretty shocking since we were not given any preparation and it felt out of nowhere and so sudden. After that moment, the movie felt really intense because the group who took over the school were very brutal & ruthless. I was not sure the rating of this movie but in Catchplay+ it was classified for 17+, likely due to some graphic violence and profanity.

The movie itself was suspenseful because of its nature of school shooting, in particular with students being held captive and obviously some senseless killings done. I actually quite like the way Jennifer tried her best to save herself and her school friends because she did not seem like a professional. Many times she had to use her wits and sometimes luck and even got hurt and injured multiple times (so she was not the superhuman type). I think Isabel May did her job quite well in here.

I also like Eli Brown who I thought was convincing enough as the main villain Tristan Voy, plus Olly Sholotan as Lewis. However, the adults were not as good as I would have preferred, with Thomas Jane in particular who aside from 1 cool scene towards the end, did not provide anything worthwhile mentioning. Oh, there were also other minor support characters, but the only one I was familiar with was Cyrus Arnold as Kip who quite stood up. Btw, I really did not like Radha Mitchell's character in here as I thought she did not exactly provide any added value, though it's not because of her characterization but more towards how the character was written.

This movie was directed by Kyle Rankin (Night of the Living Deb, Infestation etc) who was also the writer. It premiered in Venice Film Festival back in 2020, so it was pretty late in entering in Indonesia. But unlike other films which premiered in festivals, this one did not have an artsy feel at all. In fact I felt this to have a quite good entertainment value, which is probably why it has a better audience rating than critical rating. If you read some of the critics' comments, I thought it was pretty harsh. Some people compared this against Die Hard which I felt was a bit too far off. I personally think it was more like the 1991 movie Toy Soldiers (starring Sean Astin, Wil Wheaton and few others) where a high school was taken over by a group of terrorist and few students tried their best to fight against them. 

Overall this was a pretty enjoyable action thriller movie to me. It has some intense moments arising from the extreme violence done by the students taking over the school (which happened quite a lot in the US). Its duration of 109 minutes was OK, but the very last scene before the end felt like made just to satisfy audience, though it was too predictable. So if you are interested in seeing this kind of movie, then you could give it a try.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars