Alan Ritchson plays Hank Malone, an "outlandishly muscled fixer, of sorts," in Runner, the latest release from faith-based distributor Angel Studios — and this time the label is chasing straightforward base entertainment rather than the faith audience that built its name. Owen Wilson co-headlines the thriller, directed by Scott Waugh. The Guardian's review delivers a verdict that cuts both ways: the film is "serviceable B-movie camp."

The premise itself is the film's most distinctive asset. As the review notes, "of the many, many variations on the hammy late-summer action romp, very few have applied the gonzo B-movie treatment — physics-defying car chases, knee-smashing violence and the like — to the practice of organ transportation." Donor delivery, in other words, becomes the engine of the plot — a choice the critic signals as both absurd and unexpectedly fresh within a crowded subgenre.

Ritchson's Hank Malone does not announce that mission at the outset. "Donor delivery is not the direction you think things are going in upon first meeting Hank Malone," the review observes, suggesting the film withholds its full premise until the machinery of the plot is already in motion.

What earns the film its qualified praise is craft. The Guardian credits "impressive stunts and tongue-in-cheek flourishes" for elevating Waugh's "silly Aussie action flick" above its material. The pairing is telling: the stunts supply the spectacle, while the self-aware tone — the tongue-in-cheek register — signals that the filmmakers know exactly what kind of picture they are making.

The review situates Runner within the broader economics of genre filmmaking. Angel Studios, best known for faith-based releases, is using the film as "the latest attempt" to "enter the market of more straightforward base entertainment." For a distributor whose brand identity was built on a very different audience, a muscle-bound action vehicle with Ritchson — now a proven action lead — and Wilson represents a deliberate pivot.

The verdict, finally, rests on calibration. "Serviceable" is the operative word: the film does its job without transcending it. "B-movie camp" locates its pleasures precisely — in the exaggeration, the violence, the winking excess the review catalogs — rather than in any pretense to more.

For audiences, that distinction matters. Runner promises competence and camp, not reinvention, and the Guardian's assessment suggests it delivers on those terms. For Angel Studios, the film stands as a test case: whether the distributor's brand can stretch to accommodate late-summer action product, and whether gonzo organ-run cinema can carve out a lane of its own.