Between The Drama and Our Hero, Balthazar, it’s been a year for movies with something to say socially, through the prism of a theoretical mass shooting. Then again, the latter film is much more in tune with Ari Aster’s Eddington, making a satirical point about the temptation for some men to leverage social concern to acquire clout and impress girls.
Balthazar (Jaeden Martell) is an odd kid of extreme wealth and privilege who goes to an elite New York City prep school. Much like the guy in Eddington who Googled “Angela Davis” to talk to a girl at a rally, Balthazar’s favorite hobby is posting TikToks of himself crying over school shootings. His mom (Jennifer Ehle) is off pursuing a job and possibly a romance with a politician who’s an obvious stand-in for Hakeem Jeffries, while his dad isn’t around, but is outsourcing his side of the parenting to a life coach (Noah Centineo).
Balthazar’s social media activities get him in touch with a potential shooter named Solomon (Asa Butterfield), who lives in relative poverty in the rural South. Balthazar comes up with a convoluted plan: He’ll use his unlimited wealth and lack of parental supervision to fly to Texas to save the day, stop the shooting, and impress a girl he likes (Pippa Knowles), who’s a gun-control activist.
There are hints, right from the jump, that it won’t go his way; I was pretty inept with girls high school, but never saw it fit to invite a girl to my room and show her school shooting footage. Once the film shifts to Texas, two things are clear: Balthazar’s blinkered by his privilege, and Solomon’s story is more compelling. He’s an angry young man, seeking the approval of his father (Chris Bauer), a sometime porno actor-turned-scam supplement guru with the fantastic name: “Beaver Jackson.” One conclusion is that these very different young men would’ve turned out better if they’d had fathers who were around, and not terrible.
The director, Oscar Boyson, is an associate of the Safdie brothers, and while Our Hero, Balthazar, isn’t much like a Safdie movie in a stylistic way, there’s some of the overarching cynicism of the Safdies’ work. Boyson has cast two actors who were former child stars—Martell was the “Nazi child” in the first Knives Out movie, among other roles, while Butterfield starred in Martin Scorsese’s Hugo. Both have evolved into fascinating actors as adults; while Martell has mostly played other young oddballs, Butterfield shows another gear here. Not everything lands, as nothing involving the “life coach” makes sense, nor does the Hakeem Jeffries arc have much of a payoff. But the ending’s perfect.
Our Hero, Balthazar, was shot in 2024 and debuted at Tribeca in 2025. It was, not surprisingly, a hard sell, especially considering the subject matter, and the fact that Eddington mostly tanked early last year. But it got a release in March, along with a one-night-only re-release last Thursday, before landing on digital in August. It’s an off-beat entry that’s deserving of a look.