On a seemingly ordinary day, an unidentified missile is launched from an unknown location in East Asia toward the United States. The powers that be, none of whom are expecting an attack, scramble to implement their emergency action plans. They appear to have an effective system in place, surrounded by detailed monitors and folders of plans. Many in each governmental department are ready to respond. Nevertheless, the room’s atmosphere becomes supremely tense as those involved realize the stakes. Coffee is spilled; banter ceases; and phones, previously stowed before entering the top-secret rooms, are retrieved to make calls to loved ones in anticipation of the worst.

A House of Dynamite replays these same events from multiple perspectives and ends on a note of uncertainty. Each section switches to a different location and a different branch responsible for handling the crisis. When this occurs, a title appears on screen (FEMA, for instance). In each section, there is a brief glimpse into the personal lives of those attempting to solve the impending attack. A crucial mistake, which indicates that U.S. security is not all it’s cracked up to be, is replayed as it is experienced by multiple parties. The succeeding sections clarify the scope and implications of this error. The film ends with none other than the president of the United States (Idris Elba) about to make the final call.

Director Kathryn Bigelow has famously stated that action cinema is “pure cinema,” and the film is nothing if not relentlessly paced. Yet, though I admire her apparent aim—to depict the instability of the modern world—the above description makes the movie sound infinitely more compelling than it actually is. By the end, Bigelow is going for a much more sinister and humorless Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. Much of what precedes it feels like an advertisement for the various U.S. branches of defense; the credit titles only heighten this impression. The plot is preoccupied almost entirely with whether the various administrative processes can handle an unprecedented situation, only halfheartedly flirting with the chaos it insists the political world contains. While the multiple perspectives do heighten the magnitude of any action taken, they do little else except reinforce that everyone involved has a family. This results in monotony and sentimentality rather than something reminiscent of Rashomon. Far from conveying the instability of a world full of powerful nations bristling with nuclear weapons, the timeline is so tidily arranged that it brought this viewer closer to sleep than to fear.

Furthermore, for a scenario concerned with an unidentified nuclear threat to U.S. security, the film is stunningly incurious about America’s role as an international political entity. As such, far from conveying the contemporary terror it seeks to, A House of Dynamite actually feels more like a warning about the nuclear threat from a much more stable past.

A House of Dynamite begins streaming on Netflix on October 24, 2025.