It’s been 10 years since Padraig McKinley directed a handful of episodes of the hit series Kingdom, which aired on the Audience Network on DirecTV. Now, a decade later, he makes his feature film directorial debut with The Weight.
In the film, you can see McKinley’s background in television largely through transitions. With the number of fadeouts to a black screen, I was surprised a commercial didn’t appear at random. Outside of that, you experience a film that showed its highest peaks in the trailer. The drama, sound, and suspense were all high points, but far too much time was spent in buildup without a satisfactory product for a result.
In this Depression-era survival thriller, Samuel Murphy (Ethan Hawke) is separated from his daughter, Penny (Avy Berry), after he gets arrested and sent off to dig. While serving time, he meets Rankin (Austin Amelio), Singh (Avi Nash), and Olson (Lucas Lynggaard Tønnesen), who are also serving time doing hard labor in the heat. The man running the show, J.J. Clancy (Russell Crowe), who takes a liking to Murphy’s leadership and experience. Clancy makes him an offer he can’t refuse, and before you know it, he’s off with Rankin, Singh, and Olson into the woods. With five days and packs of gold in their possession, the group has to find their way to the meeting spot or die trying.
In 1933, the United States faced the greatest financial crisis in its history. The unemployment rate in the U.S. reached 25 percent, and Oregon saw its most important industries, including logging, farming, and mining, destroyed. Hardworking Americans lost their homes, their savings, and their futures. The federal government was confiscating privately held gold in the United States in an effort to stabilize the economy. The film represents two sides of the event: the distance those in power will go to sidestep the systems in place and the differing circumstances for the poor, less connected working class.
Sam Murphy and the crew he assembled were tasked with transporting gold from their labor camp 50+ miles in five days. As shown in the film’s trailer, Clancy explains to the group that no one is to be trusted when it comes to gold. Watching everyone’s reaction reminded me of “dragon sickness” from The Hobbit. Staring into those Kiwi eyes of Crowe’s, I could just hear, “I will not part with a single coin. Not one piece of it!” During their trek, a woman who escaped their labor camp, Anna (Julia Jones), joined the fold and ended up becoming a pivotal supporter of Murphy’s. The film does an excellent job of staying on task (the plot) and not deviating from it.
Where the film could improve was the “fade-to-commercial” transitions that would continuously see the screen go black, and its timeline. For a film just under two hours, the first 90 minutes were spent building up suspense to an almost impossible finish. It was already a slow burn to begin with, but with so much dialogue and not enough action/violence in between, the film starts dragging earlier than it should. The plot was good in theory, but it wasn’t executed with a powerful delivery, leaving much to be expected.
The Weight gets a 7.5 out of 10. The cast was great, the acting was top-notch, but the film moves at a snail’s pace. It’s one of Ethan Hawke’s best films; I just hope people stay awake long enough to experience it. So many parts were interesting (crossing the bridge, crossing the river, the possibility of someone following them), but once they were over, we’d be drowning in dialogue until the next hiccup on their path.
The Weight premieres in theaters on Friday, September 18.
-Jon Jones
Photos: Vertical Entertainment
Genre: Action/Thriller
Rating: R
Runtime: 1 hr 53 mins
Trailer: Watch
U.S. Release Date: September 18, 2026