Primetime takes us back a couple of decades to the heyday of To Catch a Predator, a controversial television sensation predicated on luring would-be predators into a televised sting. And the content in the film—in the form of sexual abuse, exposed genitalia, graphic sexual conversations and lots of foul language—takes this film well out of the range of family viewing.
The camera never blinks.
It stares straight at its quarry, catching every eye twitch, every nostril flare, every panicked lick of the lips. It feels no mercy, entertains no excuse. It sees. It knows. It keeps it all close—until the time comes to cut, edit, sensationalize and share. Share with a rapt audience that can’t get enough.
For Chris Hansen, that camera is an instrument of justice: A video cudgel to hammer the wicked. A media courtroom to punish the guilty.
The camera is a tool to, and for, “Catch a Predator.”
It’s 2006, and Hansen’s segments for the television news magazine Dateline NBC, have become a national sensation. Working hand-in-hand with a group called Perverted Justice, and often alongside law enforcement, Hansen and his crew jump into chat rooms masquerading as underaged girls and boys. They connect with would-be predators, capturing every lurid thought and suggestion those predators might type. They lure them to a house, where Hansen and his crew hide—ready to pounce. And then comes the payoff: Hansen strides into the room, confronting the would-be predator with his own words. The man sweats and stammers. He tries to apologize or make excuses or, sometimes, run.
But it’s too late. The cameras have caught their villain, ready to serve him up, like a still-wriggling fish, to Dateline’s millions of viewers.
Some say that Chris Hansen is a hero, taking scores of would-be abusers off the streets and sending them to jail. Others argue that the show is sensationalistic and—in how it arguably entraps its predators—troubling.
But no one can argue with the show’s popularity. By late 2006, NBC execs plan to spin those “To Catch a Predator” sequences into their very own primetime show—one airing opposite ABC’s own sensation, Lost.
Validation for a job well done? Well, maybe not. The exec who makes the decision admits that he doesn’t even like To Catch a Predator that much. But no matter: For Chris, it’s the opportunity of a lifetime. A chance to make a difference. A chance to make a splash. A chance to make Stone Phillips—NBC’s top dog in the news division—jealous for a change.
But to make this opportunity work, Chris and his team, led by producer Andie Bender and Perverted Justice’s Xavier Von Erck, will have to find perverts worthy of primetime. They need to be more tawdry, more depraved. And, if possible, more powerful. Wouldn’t it be great to catch a congressman? Wouldn’t it be fantastic to move past the show’s usual bottom feeders and harpoon a whale?
But as Chris and Andie put their plans in motion, someone is watching. Watching Chris take a woman—not his wife—out to dinner. Watching as the woman suggestively bites Chris’s thumb. Watching. Watching.
And the camera never blinks.
Primetime is based on Chris Hansen’s real work on To Catch a Predator. And let’s face it: The show is not an example of fine journalism. From what we see in the movie, the show is purposely sensationalistic. And most of those who participate in it are at least as interested in great ratings as good works.
But the core purpose behind the show—to take potentially dangerous pedophiles off the streets—is to be commended. Remember, these are folks who are actively seeking to make contact with underage boys and girls. We don’t know whether they’ve abused teens in the past, but it feels like a safe bet to assume the show has saved some people from abuse.
Chris wants to make that sort of positive difference in the world. Sure, his motives are mixed, but he truly wants to save kids from abuse—and punish those who would abuse them.
“What you’re doing is more than acting,” he tells Dan Plumb, a decoy actor who frequently plays a 13-year-old boy for To Catch a Predator. “You’re cleansing the world of an ancient evil.” Dan comes to embrace that call to action for a time. Dan’s fellow decoy, a woman named Del, sees it as a form of activism. And when something crops up on the show’s merchandise site that turns the show’s purpose into an awful joke, she demands that the merch be taken down.
Some of Chris’ fans tell him that he’s doing the “Lord’s work.” One of To Catch a Predator’s sting sites features a cross hanging on a wall. One of the predators “caught” by Chris and his crew is a rabbi. A Bible rests on a hotel nightstand.
The film also includes a flashback of sorts, to when Chris was doing a series of stories in India about child slave labor there. He learned that children were disappearing from a string of small villages, and a source apparently points him to an isolated cave. There he, and we, see a disfigured man (or, perhaps, a monster) who was taking and (the movie suggests) killing and perhaps eating these children. We don’t know the nature of this monster (which appears to be a creation for Primetime, not anything based on the experiences of the real Chris Hansen), but in Chris’ mind in the movie, it takes on a supernatural hue, becoming less man and more demon—that “ancient evil” he tells Dan about.
Primetime obviously deals with sex, perversion and—because the predators we see here are looking to make sexual contact with underage victims—sexual abuse. We unpack those behaviors in greater detail in Violent Content. However, viewers should still be warned that they’ll be exposed to full-frontal male nudity, as well as near-pornographic descriptions of sexual acts and body parts from predators to their victims. References to masturbation are frequent, and nods to bestiality are heard as well.
Chris is married, but he’s been having a long-standing affair with another woman. Chris acknowledges as much to his wife, saying that everything she’s accused him of doing over the years is absolutely true.
However, Chris is determined to break things off with his paramour: He tells the woman: “One thing I am not guilty of is falling in love with you.” But during the break-up dinner (which was probably in itself a mistake), his mistress takes Chris’ hand and puts his thumb into her mouth, biting it suggestively.
The moment is caught by a lurking photographer, and soon an editor for a supermarket tabloid is calling Chris—asking for comment and insinuating that the affair will soon be more widely known. Later, Chris’ wife receives a call from the same tabloid, asking for her thoughts.
A man is caught watching porn in his hotel room: We don’t see anything, but we hear noises coming from his laptop, and he wears nothing but his underwear and a pair of goggles (designed, I’d guess, to make the images look 3-D). Dialog and jokes can revolve around sex, arousal, body parts and sex toys. We see men in their underwear. A man shaves his chest. A female actor for To Catch a Predator can play either a girl or boy—either as young as 13—and we see her in both guises. That same actor refuses to participate in filming until a thong—branded with a message that the thong’s “contents” are guaranteed to be over age 18—is taken off the show’s merchandise website.
Primetime features many adults masquerading as underage teens in order to catch predators. Although these adults do so willingly, they still represent the very real victims those predators would have targeted. For instance, a predator exposes himself to an actor, holding a cannister of whipped cream as he does so. One of Chris’ colleagues—masquerading as a 13-year-old boy in chat groups—receives a pic from another man exposing himself. (Moviegoers see what those men are showing in both instances.)
When Chris Hansen snares his quarry, he often quotes the predator’s very own words that they typed out in a chat room. These conversations can be incredibly wince-worthy, including descriptions of body parts, sexual acts and different sexual pastimes that the predator suggests they play. In the movie’s opening scenes, we see Chris recite a snippet of an incredibly lewd chatroom conversation—repeating certain near-pornographic phrases again and again, which can feel violating in and of itself.
When Chris gets home late one night, he wakes his two pre-pubescent children and makes them watch an episode of To Catch a Predator—an episode predicated on underage abuse and filled with all that tawdry dialogue.
Dan Plumb’s first “acting” assignment is a doozy. He doesn’t know that his part is, essentially, serving as “bait” for To Catch a Predator, and he’s whisked into his role without warning. NBC staff take off his clothes and give him others (to more closely mimic what a 13-year-old boy would wear) as the producer, Andie, tells him about his “role.” They sprint out of the room and, seconds later, the would-be predator enters. He drops his drawers and exposes himself to the 23-year-old actor. Dan’s reaction, quickly suppressed, is a mixture of horror, disgust, surprise and shame: This is sexual assault, pure and simple—aided and abetted by the show itself. And later, he cries.
This echoes—intentionally, I think—how many of the predators’ intended victims would likely react had the men found their intended targets. The scene itself is heartbreaking, but what it illustrates is horrifying.
On a plane, a fan of To Catch a Predator asks if Chris would like to kill the people he catches and make them bleed. Someone in law enforcement talks about putting a pedophile’s head on a spike—just before leading a team of heavily armed policemen to a suspect’s house.
A man is tackled and wrestled to the ground after trying to escape one of Chris’ sting operations. When Chris talks about trying to track down those missing children in India, he says that they were later found “in bits.” A would-be predator grabs Chris during a sting before crew members pull him away. (Chris later scrubs his hand frantically, hoping to wash away some hidden stain.) We hear references to pillories set up in American towns hundreds of years ago, comparing them to the public shaming that television allows for.
[Spoiler Warning] A man takes his own life. We see him through a window before he shoots himself, and blood sprays across the glass. (Andie later says that she can “use” the footage in the show.)
About 37 f-words and another 17 or so s-words—many of the latter in the lyrics of a song. We also hear characters say “a–,” “b–ch,” “h—” and several crudities pertaining to male body parts.
Chris offers to buy Dan a glass of wine. When Dan orders a light beer instead, Chris tells him not to worry about the cost: NBC is paying. So Dan decides to order a non-light beer instead.
Chris drinks what appears to be whiskey. Andie and another TV exec drink cocktails during lunch. A would-be predator brings a bottle of champagne to a house, apparently hoping that he and his underage target will share it.
The motives for many of the folks associated with To Catch a Predator are mixed at best. Chris believes he is doing good, honorable work, but he mixes that ethos with unbridled ego and self-deception. He insists that there’s no “acting” involved in his role, and yet he practices his lines ad nauseam. He clearly wants to stoke his own career at the expense of not just the people he snares, but his most loyal workmates.
Andie seems nicer than Chris, but her motives seem more sordid, too. We don’t hear her talking about the good work that To Catch a Predator does—unless it’s specifically to impress someone else. She’s wrapped up in ratings, and she’ll use any squalid or tragic element she can (including a suicide) if it means creating a more compelling show.
Chris and Andie both mock and belittle the people they snare, seemingly seeing them merely as conduits to achieve their professional objectives. Certainly, many will be sympathetic to that outlook—and yet, it feels as though we should not make light of sin, temptation and man’s fallen nature. What unfurls in those camera-filled houses is used to fill a sensationalist TV show. What’s often lost is the tragedy behind it all.
On a plane, a passenger sitting next to Chris talks about his own desire to hurt—to kill—the predators that Chris encounters. “Don’t you just want to bleed them?” he asks, the camera capturing the man’s red face and angry eyes.
“I think maybe what I do is a little worse,” Chris says with a smile.
The real To Catch a Predator was indeed controversial in its time. On one hand, the 2004-2007 To Catch a Predator show and segments, according to NBC, led to the apprehension of 238 men. (About half of those were eventually convicted.) But from the start, critics accused Chris Hansen and his show of being more concerned with ratings than justice. And many said that the show was guilty of entrapment. “When a TV show makes you feel sorry for potential child-rapists, you know it’s doing something wrong,” wrote British television critic Charlie Brooker. (You can read more about the ethical quandaries at the heart of the original show here.)
Primetime does make you feel a little sorry for some of these would-be predators, too, humanizing them—at least for some. But the film’s most interesting turn is in its focus on Dan Plumb, the actor who masquerades as a 13-year-old boy. Primetime suggests that the show treated the 23-year-old Dan much like a predator would treat his underage quarry. Step by step, Andie and Chris bring Dan into their world—encouraging him, plying him with gifts, normalizing this strange, chaotic environment … all the while exposing him to difficulties and depravity and forcing him to, in a small way, take part in them. Dan just wanted to become an actor. Instead, he becomes something very different: a lure to hook a prized fish to be cooked in the heat of public loathing and served up steaming.
Is this film fair? The real Chris Hansen says no. And he’ll tell you so himself if you see Primetime in a theater. He’s allegedly purchased ads in front of every showing of the film, advertising the very similar work he’s now doing on TruBlu—which he calls “my streaming network.”
Primetime is a strong movie with some potentially award-worthy performances. Robert Pattinson (Chris), Merritt Wever (Andie) and Skyler Gisondo (Dan) all do good work here. And the film does a fine job of exploring what I think are the moral complexities and paradoxes at the heart of To Catch a Predator.
But just like Dan in his very first gig for the show, Primetime exposes us to a lot of problems, too, from unveiled genitalia to near-pornographic conversations—and all underlaid with the grim theme of sexual abuse. As it unravels the contradictions and hypocrisies of To Catch a Predator, it serves up its own.
Should people really watch a show like this? The movie seems to ask. And yet, all the show’s problems wind up in the movie, too. And in spite of the Primetime’s obviously fictional setting, the question still feels valid: Should people really watch?
Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.
