You watch a movie like Send Help – a very clever, well-written, star-led genre film – and you can get a good sense of the state of the industry today. The movie is directed by Sam Raimi, a filmmaker who has directed several blockbusters, even though his heart appears to lie in his smaller, stranger films. Send Help is an attempt to split the difference. Rachel McAdams is a star, if not a particularly big one, and the film’s premise – a biting twist on a classic – is hooky enough to get audiences. Which this film did, albeit in a modest way. $94 million dollars for a gnarly, hard-R-rated satire seems like a miracle in 2026, even if it pales in comparison to other Raimi mega-hits like Spider-Man and Doctor Strange: Multi-Verse of Madness. Still, Raimi should be pleased. This film is funny and mean, a commentary of contemporary economic striving that’s less pedantic than, say, Rubert Oslünd’s Triangle of Sadness, and it speaks to a specific cinematic vision. It’s successful, in part, because it feels like Raimi is the only who could’ve directed it.

Then you must contend with the film’s CGI effects, which are ample and which are atrocious. Most of the movie takes place on a deserted island in East Asia. A plane meant for Bangkok crash lands in the ocean and has only two survivors: Bradley Preston (Dylan O’Brien), the brash young CEO of a financial management company, and Linda Liddle (Rachel McAdams), the diligent but frumpy workhorse whom Bradley is trying to squeeze out. Bradley’s father promised the hard-working Linda an executive promotion, but when the father dies and Bradley takes over, the new boss decides to give the position to his much less capable friend, Donovan (Xavier Samuel). Linda, aghast, confronts Bradley, who gives Linda an opportunity: come on the trip to Bangkok and prove you deserve the position over Donovan. Of course, this is all a ruse to make Linda do all the work that Bradley and Donovan will present as their own, but none of that matters when the plane goes down and Linda and Donovan are left alone on the island to survive.

Linda’s obsession with the reality series Survivor (her embarrassing audition tape is one of the many things Bradley mocks her for), means she has the knowledge to live in the wilderness. She uses that knowledge to build shelter, find and cook food, even help Bradley mend a leg injury. When Bradley proves ungrateful, she withdraws her services, causing the power dynamic between them to change instantly. The film’s first act lays it on thick the degree to which Bradley and his work pals disdain Linda’s very existence, and their level of cruelty within earshot of her makes Linda easy to root for. But Send Help‘s script (written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift), makes the decision not to make Linda a benevolent savior to the suddenly helpless Bradley. Understandably, she comes to enjoy her newfound power over the man who once held her professional future in his hands, and doesn’t have any plans to give it up, even if that means foiling plans to get off the island.

If you’re wondering how ridiculous it is for the beautiful McAdams to play the dowdy office drag, it’s quite ridiculous. Raimi does his best to give her extra wrinkles, frizzy hair, an added mole or two. It’s McAdams who does the actual heavy-lifting in the part which requires a swan-ification in its second act. She’s an actor who has long been undervalued, even though her artistic and commercial track record is difficult to argue with. Shockingly, this is McAdams’s first film role since 2023’s Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, a film and performance so good and so disappointingly overlooked. In that film, she’s the main character’s warm but beleaguered mother, a precise turn of realism in a studio comedy. Send Help is McAdams in a completely different tenor, less trustworthy and much more commanding. Part of her brilliance is how you’re never totally certain if Linda’s turn is motivated by Bradley’s mistreatment or if she had a monster in her all along. Even as you try to suss it out, you still find yourself rooting for her.

I simply must bring up the CGI again, which in certain ways allows Raimi to lean into his baser, creature feature instincts. But this isn’t a monster movie, it’s a movie about the monstrousness of humanity. So when we see a wild boar and it looks like a reject from the 2019 Lion King movie, it’s hard to really take it seriously. Same can be said for larger shots of the island which have the slop-y tinge of AI. This is all the more frustrating when you know they filmed on location, but wouldn’t allow Raimi the budget for a simple helicopter shot. It’s so bad, it feels like a statement: a middle finger to executives who don’t believe an original, particular vision deserves the money of something they may deem more substantial. Send Help‘s commercial success allows us to tell these people that they’re wrong. But will they learn the lesson?

When Linda truly goes Annie Wilkes mode in the film’s final act, I knew we were getting a return to form from Raimi, whose always had great fun reminding us just how despicable we’re all capable of being. As her foil, Dylan O’Brien’s portrayal of Bradley is also wonderful; perfectly ignorant, infuriatingly egotistical, pathetically vulnerable when the shit hits the fan. By the end, it becomes a battle of insecurity as much as it is a battle of wills between the two of them. As a commentary of what we value in today’s professional climate, Send Help doesn’t pull punches even if its observations aren’t particularly insightful. The movie’s final sequence is a doozy, dismounting perfectly and finally allowing McAdams the movie star showcase we all know she can pull off. It’s a well-made movie that overcomes its flaws because its star is just that good.

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Directed by Sam Raimi