Bad Day at the Office (2026)
If you have ever wished a film would drop you headfirst into the chaos and simply not let up, Bad Day at the Office is built for you. Chee Keong Cheung's first-person action thriller is a lean, frantic, adrenalised ride that wears its influences loudly, and while it will not be for everyone, those who click with this style will have a blast. I had a lot of fun with it, and I am giving it three and a half stars.
The debt to Hardcore Henry is obvious and unmissable, this is a film shot almost entirely from the characters' point of view, GoPro strapped to the action, and there is a good dose of Crank in its relentless, propulsive energy too. Cleverly, though, it does not lock us into a single pair of eyes the whole way through. It switches perspective between John Hannah's amnesiac Karl and the other players around him, and that simple choice does a lot to break up what could have become a nauseating single-take slog, giving the eye somewhere new to go.
The action itself is exactly what you want from this sort of thing: visceral, frantic and relentless, staged with real energy. What tips it into something distinctive are the on-screen overlays, which lend the whole thing a video-game sheen, objectives, prompts, that first-person-shooter feel. It is a smart fit for the material, and I suspect it is precisely what will make this land with younger audiences, who will recognise the grammar of it instantly, even if the themes skew a little older (it stays age-appropriate).
Performance-wise it is a mixed bag, but the central one holds. John Hannah carries the film with real conviction as Karl, a man piecing together who he is while being hunted across the city, and he gives it a grounded centre it badly needs. The supporting cast are more uneven, a slightly hammy procession of broad Russian and cockney accents that occasionally tip towards caricature, though in a film pitched at this register that is easier to forgive than it might be elsewhere.
The story is decent too, more substantial than the breathless format might suggest, and it has a genuinely good twist tucked away towards the end that recontextualises things nicely. It is not reinventing the wheel, but it keeps you guessing just enough between the set pieces.
Three and a half stars. Bad Day at the Office is a bold, breathless and genuinely inventive first-person thriller that knows exactly what it is and commits to it completely. It will not win over everyone, the POV gimmick and the broad supporting turns will put some off, but if this is your kind of ride, strap in, because you will rate it highly. Carried by a solid John Hannah and a cracking final twist, it is a blast.
Related on Movies With Macca
More from Country United Kingdom: The Red Shoes (1948), The Driver (1978), Interstellar (2014)
More from the 2020s: All That's Left of You (2025), The Whale (2022), Look Back (2024)
More action: The Mummy (1999), The Mummy (2017)
