Nineteen years after making his directorial debut with Gone Baby Gone, Ben Affleck returns behind the camera with Animals, a star-studded thriller now streaming on Netflix. But the reception has been far from warm.
A Political Thriller With a Familiar Premise
Animals follows Mark Kimball (Affleck), a candidate for mayor of Los Angeles whose world is upended when an anonymous caller with a disguised voice informs him that his son has been kidnapped and demands a $7 million ransom. Alongside his wife Abigail (Kerry Washington), Kimball enlists crisis specialist Dayle Burton (Gillian Anderson) to navigate the ordeal. The film also stars Steven Yeun.
What Critics Praised
A minority of reviewers found merit in the production. The Guardian noted that “all the ingredients of a good thriller are there: a star cast, a countdown, issues of money, power and ambition.” Many acknowledged Affleck’s technical skill, particularly a sequence shot in a single take. Écran Large described the kidnappers’ phone call as creating “a genuine crescendo of tension in which the forces at play, their temperaments, and the location at the heart of the story are skillfully established.” Radio Times was the most generous, awarding four out of five stars and calling it “a poignant drama.”
A Wave of Negative Reviews
The praise largely ends there. Rogerebert.com called it “Ben Affleck’s worst film behind the camera,” citing shallow character construction and a screenplay that “doesn’t take enough risks to be even remotely morally complex.”
Variety dismissed the film as “watchable but forgettable,” arguing that it squanders its potential for political satire in favor of “a marital melodrama and a very hollow ‘what would you do?’ dilemma.” Deadline and Première criticized the film for “going in all directions, trying to be simultaneously a movie about a marriage in crisis, a kidnapping thriller, and a committed film about politics, class struggle and immigration.”
The Kurosawa Question
Critics widely agree that Animals is an unacknowledged remake — not of just any film, but of Akira Kurosawa’s 1963 masterpiece High and Low, as well as Spike Lee’s recent reinterpretation, Highest 2 Lowest. Affleck has repeatedly denied the connection throughout the film’s promotional campaign, insisting in multiple interviews that he has never seen the Kurosawa original.
A Career in Retreat?
For The Guardian and Variety, the verdict is clear: after a remarkable debut with Gone Baby Gone and an Oscar-winning third feature in Argo, Affleck now appears content to simply “do the job, but no more.”
