Ted K | |
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Directed by | Tony Stone |
Written by |
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Produced by |
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Starring | Sharlto Copley |
Cinematography | Nathan Corbin |
Edited by |
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Music by | Blanck Mass |
Production companies |
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Distributed by |
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Release dates |
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Running time | 122 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Box office | $35,973 [1] |
Ted K is a 2021 American historical crime drama film written, directed, produced, and edited by Tony Stone. Starring Sharlto Copley as Ted Kaczynski, also known as the Unabomber, the film follows the mathematics prodigy turned domestic terrorist through the events leading to his arrest.
Ted K premiered at the 71st Berlin International Film Festival on March 1, 2021 and was released in the United States by Neon's Super Ltd on February 18, 2022. The film received generally positive reviews from critics, with praise aimed towards Stone's direction and Copley's performance.
Since 1971, mathematics prodigy Ted Kaczynski has lived a primitive life in a remote cabin near Lincoln, Montana. He hunts for his food and lives without electricity or running water. He strongly believes modern technology is destroying the planet.
Kaczynski witnesses the destruction of the wilderness surrounding his cabin and concludes that living in nature is impossible. He goes to the library and acquires the address of Percy Wood, the president of United Airlines. He damages a neighbor's snowmobile, cuts down a power line, and destroys nearby construction equipment. He grows frustrated with the number of jets flying over his home, calling it his breaking point. To fight back against the destruction of nature, he creates a plan for revenge.
Kaczynski mails bombs to important people that he believes will harm society. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) becomes involved when a bomb injures and nearly kills Wood inside his house. Kaczynski changes his appearance by shaving his beard and slamming his nose against a cinder block. Computer store owner Hugh Scrutton is the first to die from one of his bombs.
Eighteen months later, Kaczynski is in desperate need of money. He argues with his brother David over the phone. He writes a 35,000-word manifesto and uses the word "we" when writing to local newspapers about the bombings. The country begins to refer to him as the "Unabomber". He sends a letter to The New York Times and The Washington Post , promising to stop his bombing spree if they publish his manifesto. The Washington Post complies on September 19, 1995.
David recognizes the prose style of the manifesto as Ted's and reports his suspicions. The FBI arrest Kaczynski in 1996. He is given life in a supermax prison in Florence, Colorado, for killing three people and injuring twenty-three others. An epilogue recognizes the manhunt for Ted Kaczynski as the largest in FBI history.
Sharlto Copley announced his involvement in the film in early 2018. [2] Musician Melissa Auf der Maur, Stone's wife, served as one of the executive producers. [3]
Filming took place over four seasons in and around Lincoln, Montana. [4] [5]
The film premiered at the 71st Berlin International Film Festival, on March 1, 2021. [6] It was also screened at the Red Sea International Film Festival. [7] In March 2021, Neon's Super Ltd acquired the film's distribution rights. [5] Ted K was released in the United States on February 18, 2022. [8]
In the United States and Canada, the film earned $20,851 from twenty-eight theaters in its opening weekend, [9] and $2,385 from nine theaters in its second weekend. [10]
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes , 85% of 40 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.5/10.The website's consensus reads: "The movie's merits might be debatable, but Sharlto Copley ensures Ted K is never less than grimly compelling." [11] Metacritic , which uses a weighted average , assigned the film a score of 70 out of 100, based on 13 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. [12]
Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian said "Copley excels behind a straggly beard in this portrait of the serial terror-bomber". [13] Christy Lemire of RogerEbert.com praised Copley's performance, Tony Stone's direction, and the sound design but was critical of the reliance on fantasy sequences which she felt were unnecessary. [14] Nadir Samara of Screen Rant criticized the two-hour runtime but said "it's Copley's performance that sells it." [15]
Award | Date of ceremony | Category | Recipient(s) | Result | Ref(s) |
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Camerimage | November 20, 2021 | Main competition | Tony Stone | Nominated | [16] |
Fantasy Filmfest | October 17 – November 7, 2021 | Fresh Blood Award | Nominated | [17] | |
Stockholm International Film Festival | November 2021 | Bronze Horse | Nominated | [18] |
Lincoln is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Lewis and Clark County, Montana, United States. As of the 2010 census, the population was 1,013.
David Richard Kaczynski is an American charity worker. He is the younger brother of the domestic terrorist and mathematician Ted Kaczynski (1942–2023), also known as the Unabomber.
American Airlines Flight 444 was a scheduled American Airlines flight from Chicago to Washington, D.C.'s National Airport. On November 15, 1979, the Boeing 727 serving the flight was attacked by Ted Kaczynski, who sent a pipe bomb in the mail and set it to detonate at a certain altitude. The bomb partially detonated in the cargo hold and caused "a sucking explosion and a loss of pressure," which was then followed by large quantities of smoke filling the passenger cabin, forcing the pilots to make an emergency landing at Dulles International Airport. Twelve passengers had to be treated afterward for smoke inhalation.
The A-Team is a 2010 American action comedy film based on the 1980s television series of the same name created by Frank Lupo and Stephen J. Cannell. Directed by Joe Carnahan and written by Carnahan, Brian Bloom, and Skip Woods, the film stars Liam Neeson, Bradley Cooper, Jessica Biel, Quinton Jackson, Sharlto Copley, and Patrick Wilson. The film tells the story of a Special Forces team who, imprisoned for a crime they did not commit, escapes and sets out to clear their names. The film was produced by Cannell, Tony Scott, and his brother Ridley Scott.
Theodore John Kaczynski, also known as the Unabomber, was an American mathematician and domestic terrorist. He was a mathematics prodigy, but abandoned his academic career in 1969 to pursue a reclusive primitive lifestyle, developing a radical ideology described in his writings.
Sharlto Copley is a South African actor. His acting credits include roles in the Academy Award-nominated science fiction film District 9, the 2010 adaptation of The A-Team, the science fiction film Elysium, the science fiction horror film Europa Report and the dark fantasy adventure film Maleficent. He also played the title character in the science fiction film Chappie, Jimmy in the science fiction action film Hardcore Henry, and starred in two seasons as Christian Walker of the TV series Powers.
Elysium is a 2013 American dystopian science fiction action film written, produced, and directed by Neill Blomkamp. It was Blomkamp's second directorial effort. The film stars Matt Damon and Jodie Foster alongside Sharlto Copley, Alice Braga, Diego Luna, Wagner Moura, and William Fichtner. The film takes place on both a ravaged Earth and a luxurious artificial world called Elysium. The film itself offers deliberate social commentary that explores political and sociological themes such as immigration, overpopulation, transhumanism, health care, worker exploitation, the justice system, technology, and social class issues.
Candice DeLong is an American former FBI criminal profiler and bestselling author. DeLong was the lead profiler in San Francisco, California, and worked on the Unabomber case. Currently, she hosts the Investigation Discovery programs Deadly Women and Facing Evil with Candice DeLong, the Wondery podcast Killer Psyche, and the Discovery+ program The Deadly Type with Candice DeLong.
Chappie is a 2015 American dystopian science fiction action film directed by Neill Blomkamp and written by Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell. It stars Sharlto Copley, Dev Patel, Hugh Jackman, Ninja, Yolandi Visser, Jose Pablo Cantillo, and Sigourney Weaver. The film, set and shot in Johannesburg, is about an artificial general intelligence law enforcement robot captured and taught by gangsters, who nickname it Chappie.
Tony Stone is an American independent filmmaker. His notable work includes writing and directing the films Severed Ways (2007) and Out of Our Minds (2009), directing the documentary Peter and the Farm (2016), and cinematography for R.E.M.'s music video "It Happened Today". In 2022, he created the well-received crime drama Ted K, starring Sharlto Copley as the Unabomber.
P.O. Box Unabomber is a Bulgarian theatre play written by Zdrava Kamenova and Gergana Dimitrova. The play won "Ikar" award of the Union of Bulgarian Artists in 2012 for Best Bulgarian play of the year.
Hardcore Henry is a 2015 science fiction action film written and directed by Ilya Naishuller, and produced by Timur Bekmambetov, Naishuller, Inga Vainshtein Smith, and Ekaterina Kononenko. Will Stewart provided additional writing for the film. The film is notable for being shot entirely from the first-person perspective of its lead character.
James R. Fitzgerald is an American criminal profiler, forensic linguist, and author. He is a retired FBI agent and best known for his role in the UNABOM investigation, which resulted in the arrest and conviction of Ted Kaczynski.
Manhunt is an American drama anthology television series created by Andrew Sodroski, Jim Clemente, and Tony Gittelson, initially commissioned as a television miniseries. The first season, Manhunt: Unabomber, stars Sam Worthington and Paul Bettany, and depicts a fictionalized account of the FBI's hunt for the Unabomber. It premiered on Discovery Channel on August 1, 2017. On July 17, 2018, Charter Communications was in advanced negotiations with the series' producers to pick up the series for two additional seasons to be aired on their Spectrum cable service. The show's second season follows the hunt for Eric Rudolph, who was the perpetrator of the Centennial Olympic Park bombing, after suspicion initially fell on security guard Richard Jewell. The second season, Manhunt: Deadly Games, premiered on February 3, 2020.
Industrial Society and Its Future, also known as the Unabomber Manifesto, is a 1995 anti-technology essay by Ted Kaczynski, the "Unabomber". The manifesto contends that the Industrial Revolution began a harmful process of natural destruction brought about by technology, while forcing humans to adapt to machinery, creating a sociopolitical order that suppresses human freedom and potential.
The Last Days of American Crime is a 2020 American action thriller film directed by Olivier Megaton from a screenplay written by Karl Gajdusek, based on Rick Remender and Greg Tocchini's 2009 comic of the same name. It stars Édgar Ramírez, Anna Brewster, Michael Pitt, Patrick Bergin, and Sharlto Copley. The film's release was considered unfortunate for coinciding with the George Floyd protests due to its violent content and depictions of police brutality, leading to it being panned by critics and holding a 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes as of October 2021.
Unabomber: In His Own Words is a 2020 crime documentary four-part miniseries about Ted Kaczynski, also known as the Unabomber, that looks at his 17 years of terror from 1978 to 1995 that killed three people and injured 23.
Blacklight is a 2022 action thriller film directed and co-written by Mark Williams. The film stars Liam Neeson as a brooding FBI fixer who becomes involved in a government conspiracy; Emmy Raver-Lampman, Taylor John Smith, and Aidan Quinn also star.
Beast is a 2022 survival action horror film directed by Baltasar Kormákur from a screenplay by Ryan Engle, based on a story by Jaime Primak Sullivan. The film stars Idris Elba, Iyana Halley, Leah Jeffries, and Sharlto Copley. It follows a widowed father and his two teenage daughters who visit a South African game reserve but must fight to survive when they are stalked and attacked by a ferocious, rogue, man-killing lion.
Boy Kills World is a 2024 dystopian action comedy film directed by Moritz Mohr, in his directorial debut, from a screenplay by Tyler Burton Smith and Arend Remmers, based on a story by Arend Remmers and Moritz Mohr. The film stars Bill Skarsgård, Jessica Rothe, Michelle Dockery, Brett Gelman, Isaiah Mustafa, Yayan Ruhian, Andrew Koji, Sharlto Copley, Famke Janssen and features the voice of H. Jon Benjamin. The plot revolves around a campaign of vengeance enacted by a martial arts expert, rendered deaf-mute by an attack that killed his entire family, whose thoughts are presented as an inner voice derived from a childhood video game.