‘Leave the World Behind’ Review: Julia Roberts Plays a Doomsday Karen in Shyamalan-Like Thriller
variety.comPeter Debruge Chief Film Critic Like “Testament” — the 1983 made-for-TV movie that imagined the fallout, both nuclear and psychological, after an atomic bomb is dropped on American soil — “Leave the World Behind” depicts a plausible doomsday scenario from the perspective of a handful of ordinary characters.
Not military experts, not scientists, but two families obliged to shelter under the same roof out in the East Hamptons while something scary unfolds a few hours away, off-screen, in New York.
As the stress-prone matriarch of one of these families, Julia Roberts utters a line that earns a big laugh near the start, partly because America’s sweetheart isn’t supposed to say something so dismissive of everyone else on the planet, but also because many audiences can probably relate.
Staring out the window of her Park Slope apartment, she pronounces, “I fucking hate people.” Roberts’ character is named Amanda Sandford, but might as well be Karen, such is the rush-to-judgment, world-revolves-around-me approach she takes to others — an attitude writer-director Sam Esmail’s film allows audiences to share, for a time.
Read more on variety.com