There are two kinds of hot messes. The first is the fun kind where it is chaotic in all the right ways. The kind of movie that’s so all over the place, yet you don’t mind because it’s self-aware, campy, and honestly just fun to watch. You’re laughing both at it and with it, and that’s part of its charm. Then there’s the bad kind where it is one that’s so messy and full of itself that it borders on insulting. The kind of film that thinks it’s saying something profound, but instead just ends up tripping over its own ego. While watching Romain Gavras’ Sacrifice, I initially thought I was in for the fun kind of hot mess, until about halfway through when it became painfully clear it was the other kind. The kind that leaves you muttering, “Well, that was certainly a movie of all time.”
We follow Mike Tyler (Chris Evans), a washed-up movie star trying to salvage his career after having a public breakdown by attending a charity gala for climate change hosted by billionaire tech philanthropist Ben (Vincent Cassel) and Gloria Bracken (Salma Hayek). The gala is going as expected until a group of eco-terrorist led by Joan (Anya Taylor-Joy), take over the gala where they believe that by sacrificing three people by throwing them into a volcano, it would save humanity.
For the first act, I was actually having a pretty good time with Sacrifice. Sure, it trots out the usual “eat the rich” commentary we’ve seen a dozen times before, but there was a certain hot-mess charm to it that made it enjoyable. Most of that charm comes from Chris Evans, who’s clearly having a blast playing an actor so self-absorbed he practically sweats desperation as he clings to what’s left of his relevance. Whether he’s delivering a painfully awkward “call-out” speech that completely misses the mark or obsessing over his growing bald spot, he’s pathetic, but in a way that’s oddly endearing. Sacrifice might feel like a smug knockoff of a Ruben Östlund satire, but it still had its own quirky appeal. And with Joan and her eco-terrorist crew pulling shenanigans on the one percent, it was hard not to have fun.
But the moment the three “sacrifices” are chosen and they leave the mines, Sacrifice completely collapses under the weight of its own ambition. Suddenly, I had no idea what I was supposed to take from any of it. On one hand, I can appreciate that it tries to move beyond the standard “eat the rich” shtick to explore something more universal. How society has become obsessed with ego and performance over sincerity and honesty. That’s a solid idea in theory. But in practice, the film fumbles it so badly with a script that’s both overcomplicated and undercooked. Instead of digging into the human core of its themes, it wastes what feels like an eternity rambling about the history and ideology of the eco-terrorist group. The plot just unravels in this painfully unfunny, self-important way, and by the second half, I was rolling my eyes more than I was watching. Even the cast looked lost, like they’d collectively given up and decided to be on autopilot.
Overall, Sacrifice screams like it has something important to say, but spends nearly two hours tripping over its own noise. What starts as a fun, chaotic mess slowly morphs into the frustrating kind. Sacrifice is so convinced of its own moral depth that it forgets to actually be engaging. There are flashes of sharpness buried beneath the pretension, but by the end, Sacrifice feels less like a statement and more like static, instantly forgettable.
My Rating: C-
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