X
- 2023
- R
- Netflix
- 2 h 3 m
- 2023
- R
- Netflix
- 2 h 3 m
Summary Liza Drake (Emily Blunt) is a blue-collar single mom who has just lost her job and is at the end of her rope. A chance meeting with pharmaceutical sales rep Pete Brenner (Chris Evans) puts her on an upwards trajectory economically but dubious path ethically as she becomes entangled in a dangerous racketeering scheme. Dealing with her inc...
Directed By: David Yates
Written By: Wells Tower, Evan Hughes
- 2023
- R
- Netflix
- 2 h 3 m
- 2023
- R
- Netflix
- 2 h 3 m
Pain Hustlers
44
5.8
Where to Watch
Summary Liza Drake (Emily Blunt) is a blue-collar single mom who has just lost her job and is at the end of her rope. A chance meeting with pharmaceutical sales rep Pete Brenner (Chris Evans) puts her on an upwards trajectory economically but dubious path ethically as she becomes entangled in a dangerous racketeering scheme. Dealing with her inc...
Directed By: David Yates
Written By: Wells Tower, Evan Hughes
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Mixed or Average
Based on 34 Critic Reviews
44
15% Positive
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
74% Mixed
25 Reviews
25 Reviews
12% Negative
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
Metascore
Mixed or Average
Based on 34 Critic Reviews
44
15% Positive
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
74% Mixed
25 Reviews
25 Reviews
12% Negative
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
A real-life story with social issues about capitalism that is entertaining and funny while it makes you think, without being too earnest and serious.
The movie is constrained by its own conscience.
User Score
Mixed or Average
Based on 25 User Ratings
5.8
36% Positive
9 Ratings
9 Ratings
60% Mixed
15 Ratings
15 Ratings
4% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
User Score
Mixed or Average
Based on 25 User Ratings
5.8
36% Positive
9 Ratings
9 Ratings
60% Mixed
15 Ratings
15 Ratings
4% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
Low ratings from "critics" seems to be synonymous with depth and realistic depiction. A film this raw and expressive, and frankly just honest, could only be abandoned by critics taking the same kickbacks as big-pharma script writer. This film is beautifully shot, the cast chemistry is addictive and Emily Blunt finds that chaotic frequency she always does, while silently emitting empress energy.
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It was predictable. You pretty much know how things are going to end, yet I still found this a rather enjoyable film. I always enjoy Catherine O’Hara’s performances, a fellow Torontonian like myself!
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As the folks in this rise and fall of Pharma Frauds saga could tell you, it’s the third act where all the consequences show up and the piper must be paid. That’s where this story’s make-or-break moments are parked, and there are too few of them to let it get off the screen with as much promise as it opened with.
In the end, watching Pain Hustlers is about as numbing an experience as being prescribed the drug Liza spent her career selling.
Yates makes Pain Hustlers part-rowdy dramedy, part-half-assed takedown, and entirely an underwhelming film that attempts to make apparent and bland points.
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.
Pain Hustlers takes an off-putting mock-documentary approach to this tragedy, focusing on a handful of sleazebag salespeople who bent the rules to incentivize doctors to prescribe Lonafin (the film’s fictional Subsys substitute) first for treating cancer pain, and later for conditions as mild as migraines.
Chris Evans need to move back to the MCU if his output outside that are clunkers such as this and Gray Man. Kudos for Yates who ventured outside the Potter-verse. This film wants to be the next Wolf of Wall Street and it failed miserably, simply because the Opioid crisis has been done to death by now. Too bad for Blunt, who tried to give this project an extra heft.
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The Adam McKayfication of 'The Wolf of Wall Street.'
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(Mauro Lanari)
1) A small protest film: whoever doesn't need a remedy to soothe the pain, "cast the first stone" (incipit of the movie). The most widespread plantations in the history of humanity are always those 5 ones: Papaveraceae, gràpe varieties, coca, cannabis, tobacco. There are those who find the endogenous production of drugs more ethical: dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, (nor-)adrenaline, endorphins and phenylethylamine. De gustibus. When will there be a broader analysis of the topic beyond the anti-Big Pharma strand, perhaps already inaugurated thirty years ago by "The Fugitive" (Davis '93)? 2) David Yates directed four chapters of the "Harry Potter" saga, and the "Fantastic Beasts" trilogy. This time he changes genre and it shows. 3) Chris Evans was more credible in "Puncture", Kassen brothers 2011, a movie shot with one tenth of the budget of this biopic against the Insys Therapèutics.
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Netflix released just in August a miniseries called Painkiller that focused on the birth of the opioid crisis, with an emphasis on Purdue Pharma, a company owned by Richard Sackler and his family, which were the makers of OxyContin. The pharmaceutical eventually went bankrupt, but its owners remain free and **** Pain Hustlers is a movie that purports to redeem a drug saleswoman - portrayed by a completely unremarkable Emily Blunt - who was blinded by money, and in this story, she is the person who had a change of heart and decided to cooperate with the authorities so that justice could do its work on those who were above ****'s a rather simplistic and mundane attempt to wash away dirt that in the real world we know is a lie. After banks and the guns in the US, there's nothing more protected than the drug companies, or at least their owners, and the way this story pretends to sell that there were some repercussions is pitiful and mostly **** just to mention it because that's how the movie ends, John Kapoor, the man who inspires Andy Garcia's character was sentenced to 5 1/2 years in prison in 2020. He did not enter prison right away because of COVID and just in June of this year he was released after serving only two years. It is estimated that the once billionaire still has a fortune of nearly $800 million dollars. Justice no doubt about it.
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Production Company
Grey Matter Productions,
Wychwood Media
Release Date Oct 20, 2023
Duration 2 h 3 m
Rating R
Tagline She deals your pain.
Awards
Hollywood Makeup Artist and Hair Stylist Guild Awards
• 1 Nomination
