Ben Affleck’s sixth feature as a director puts a political campaign, a crumbling marriage and a botched kidnapping into the same pressure cooker. But despite its high-stakes setup and a cast led by Affleck and Kerry Washington, Animals reportedly struggles to turn that material into a consistently sharp crime thriller.
The Netflix film is set for release Friday, Oct. 9. Affleck directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Connor McIntyre and Billy Ray. Rated R, the movie runs 1 hour and 46 minutes.
According to The Hollywood Reporter’s review, the film is passably entertaining but delivers less suspense and thematic force than its premise promises. The publication also draws extensive parallels between Animals and Akira Kurosawa’s influential 1963 Japanese film High and Low, noting that Spike Lee released his own reimagining, Highest 2 Lowest, the previous year.
A Campaign Collides With a Kidnapping
Affleck plays Mark Kimball, a Gulf War veteran running for mayor of Los Angeles after working with the LAPD, the district attorney’s office and environmental groups. His campaign is built around rebuilding the city following the 2025 wildfires, while his messaging includes outreach to immigrant communities in Spanish.
Mark’s campaign adviser, Sam Allison, played by Steven Yeun, remains concerned about the Latino vote and pushes for increased advertising. The problem is money: Mark’s self-funded bid has already drained his resources. Sam eventually convinces him to use the family’s Westside home as collateral for another loan, arguing that victory is within reach.
That decision has been kept from Mark’s wife, Abigail, a therapist played by Washington. Their marriage is already under strain because Abigail has been having an affair for months with UCLA teacher Ron, portrayed by Ray Fisher. Ron wants their relationship to progress, but Abigail worries that leaving Mark during the campaign could damage the trust of her preteen son, Denny, played by Christopher Woodley.
The crisis arrives on Halloween. Denny is trick-or-treating with his nanny, Cecilia, played by Adriana Paz, when Mark and Abigail receive a call saying their son has been kidnapped. The caller demands $7 million and threatens to dismember the child if police become involved, forcing Mark to reveal the family’s precarious finances.
But the kidnappers have made a mistake. Because two children were wearing matching costumes, they abducted Hector, played by Jacob Estrada, instead of Denny. Hector is the son of Ramon, an undocumented ranchero portrayed by Luis Gerardo Méndez. Cecilia loves Ramon and wants to marry him.
When Denny returns safely, the Kimballs’ immediate relief gives way to a moral and financial dilemma: The kidnapper still wants the full ransom. Cecilia and Ramon must then rely on Mark and Abigail to keep their promise and pay for Hector’s return.
Gillian Anderson Steals the Spotlight
The Hollywood Reporter singles out Gillian Anderson as the movie’s liveliest presence. She plays Dayle Burton, an enigmatic, high-priced fixer brought in by Sam to manage a dangerous situation involving a public figure.
Dayle makes clear that her $1.4 million fee is due regardless of the outcome. The price doubles if she must introduce what she calls “kinetic energy.” The review describes Anderson’s controlled, coolly detached performance as a welcome jolt whenever the story begins to lose momentum.
Paz and Méndez also receive praise for bringing raw emotion to Cecilia and Ramon’s shared fear. By contrast, the review finds limited chemistry between Affleck and Washington, while Yeun’s campaign operative is said to spend much of the film projecting suspicion.
Director of photography Robert Elswit captures locations including a foreclosed Frogtown warehouse, under-policed areas in the city’s northeast and the concrete-lined L.A. River channel. Even with those settings, the review argues that later confrontations become overly complicated and messily executed.
The film’s final stretch includes the cleanup of multiple bodies and an elaborate effort to rewrite what happened. The Hollywood Reporter found that resolution difficult to believe and criticized it for shortchanging the Mexican characters. Gayle King also appears in a staged interview with Mark.
ShowBiz Take
Animals has a potent dramatic question at its center: What will privileged parents sacrifice when the kidnapped child is not their own? That conflict ties together the movie’s interest in political ambition, marital trust, financial desperation and class divisions.
The concern raised by The Hollywood Reporter is that the film does not fully capitalize on those ideas. Its similarities to High and Low make the comparison especially difficult to avoid, while the added storylines involving adultery and campaign maneuvering reportedly slow the thriller rather than deepen it.
Still, Affleck, Washington, Anderson, Yeun, Paz and Méndez give the Netflix release a highly watchable ensemble. The wider cast also includes Matt Gerald, Fisher, Woodley and Estrada. Anderson’s fixer appears to supply the sharpest edge in a movie whose title suggests more ferocity than the review found onscreen.
What Happens Next?
Animals will be released on Netflix on Friday, Oct. 9, giving audiences the chance to decide whether its kidnapping mystery has enough bite to overcome the reservations raised in the early review.