Pain Hustlers, the new film starring Emily Blunt and Chris Evans, has received negative reviews following its world premiere.
The Netflix film follows high school dropout Liza (Blunt) as she lands a job at a pharmaceutical company, with her time being marred by a criminal conspiracy with “deadly consequences.”
The film, which has been helmed by Harry Potter director David Yates, boasts a stacked supporting cast including Andy Garcia, Jay Duplass and Catherine O’Hara, but this hasn’t been enough to convince critics.
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Following its world premiere earlier this week (September 11) at the 48th Toronto International Film Festival, Pain Hustlers currently holds a meagre 19% rating on Rotten Tomatoes thus far, with only three of the 16 reviews coming back positive.
You can read selection of reviews below:
“Pain Hustlers entertains thanks to its strong leads but it’s hard not to find it a derivative look at a tough topic that relies on tropes from far superior movies.”
“While Pain Hustlers is a perfectly fine title, the film probably should have been called Liza Drake, the name of the sales rep played by Emily Blunt, who single-handedly almost saves this tone-deaf drama from itself.”
“Yates’ film is more focused on being easy to swallow than it is on meaningfully addressing the source of the pain.”
“Attempting to be an ironically entertaining cautionary tale about the evils of capitalism and the monstrousness of drug companies, Pain Hustlers fails to seduce or repel. This supposedly bitter pill goes down too easily.”
“Blunt remains committed to the end but even she can’t add a shine to the drab last act, the pleasure of seeing her on screen replaced with the pain of another undeserving project.”
Pain Hustlers will be released on Netflix on October 20.
Reporter, Digital Spy George is a freelance writer who specialises in Movies and TV. After graduating with a degree in Film Studies and Journalism from De Montfort University, in which he analysed the early works of Richard Linklater for his dissertation, he wrote for several websites for GRV Media. His film tastes vary from blockbusters like Mission: Impossible and John Wick to international directors such as Paolo Sorrentino and Hirokazu Kore-eda, and has attended both the London and Berlin film festivals.
