Leave the World Behind Review

Netflix won Rumaan Alam's novel in a bidding war in July 2020, with Sam Esmail, who created Mr. Robot, to write and direct, and Barack and Michelle Obama's Higher Ground among the producers. Esmail keeps the premise, the Sandfords (Julia Roberts and Ethan Hawke) sharing a rental with its owner, G.H. Scott (Mahershala Ali), and his daughter Ruth (Myha'la), and adds set pieces: an oil tanker running aground on the family's beach, an airliner coming down on the sand, an expressway choked with driverless Teslas that keep arriving.

Tod Campbell's camera hangs overhead and drifts restlessly between the two families, and the showing off mostly earns its place, turning a vacation house into a trap. The performances carry more. Roberts plays Amanda's contempt for people as armor she knows is cracking, Ali gives the film its authority with almost no movement, and Kevin Bacon's prepper is exactly as frightening as the part needs.

At 140 minutes it tests patience, and a late speech laying out a three-stage plan to topple a country turns ambiguity into a lecture; Alissa Wilkinson wrote that it plays like a bulleted list of everything wrong with America. The final scene will read as a joke or a thesis depending on the viewer.