News of the World

2020 Directed by Paul Greengrass

Find where you belong.

A Texan traveling across the wild West bringing the news of the world to local townspeople, agrees to help rescue a young girl who was kidnapped.

Tom Hanks Helena Zengel Michael Angelo Covino Ray McKinnon Mare Winningham Elizabeth Marvel Fred Hechinger Bill Camp Thomas Francis Murphy Gabriel Ebert Neil Sandilands Chukwudi Iwuji Christopher Hagen Stafford Douglas Michelle Campbell Clint Obenchain J. Nathan Simmons Annacheska Brown

Alternative Titles

Neues aus der Welt, Новости со всего света, 結叛同行, Relatos do Mundo

western drama adventure action

118 mins More details at IMDb TMDb Report this film

Popular reviews

Review by Lucy ★★★ 12

more than anything this reminded me that i still need to finish red dead redemption 2
Review by Nakul ★★★ 2

News of the World is a competently made, old-fashioned western road movie. It's predictable, you know where it is going but the subtle & graceful performance of Tom Hanks and the chemistry between him and Helena Zengel is what makes it work. It is Paul Greengrass' most visually striking & heartfelt film without being showy. James Newton Howard’s score was lovely. It's surprisingly timely movie too (the movie opens and ends with mention of meningitis/cholera virus outbreak and the spread of ‘fake news’ being a significant plot point).
Review by john ★★★½ 1

I kind of get why this is doing so well this award season. Watching Tom Hanks for two hours is always a treat. Watching Tom Hanks protect a child with his life is even better.
Review by davidehrlich ★★★ 6

Known for the visceral, “shaky-cam” immediacy of a vérité style that’s proven bracingly chaotic in some movies (“Captain Phillips,” “United 93”) and utterly nauseating in others (“The Green Zone”), director Paul Greengrass might seem ill-suited to direct a Western — to work in that most sweeping and stoic of American genres. But “News of the World” isn’t much interested in telling a story about the way this country tends to burnish its bloodiest chapters into myth.
Adapted from Paulette Jiles’ novel of the same name, this weary and unvarnished road trip through Reconstruction-era Texas tells the story of two lost souls who are struggling to free themselves from their memories and find a way to become whole in a dusty…
Review by matt lynch ★★½

I see this relatively patient, clearly well-intentioned, handsomely-mounted story about reconciliation and reunification and forgiveness coming away from remarkable and ongoing trauma and division, of learning from past transgressions to move on from them, of busted capitalism (Hanx literally uses money as ammunition at one point), and so help me it's been a long time since I mined any intrinsic value from that sort of timeliness. The scene where he flips the crowd by reading the inspiring story of a coal fire just seems hopelessly naive.
Review by Sean Baker 10

Was nice to see on the big screen at AMC Century City.
Arri Alexa LF, Panavision Vintage 65 & Angenieux Optimo Lenses
Arri Alexa Mini LF, Panavision Vintage 65 & Angenieux Optimo Lenses
I love Dariusz Wolski. This looks great but his film work still rules (Pirates of the Caribbean, The Crow, etc)
Review by David Chen ★★★★ 1

Tom Hanks was hosting daily news podcasts 150 years before it was cool.
Review by Thomas @ Tribeca 🤟🏽 ★★ 4

How did they manage to make a white savior movie with no POC in a main role?
Review by Owen ★★★ 4

more like Snooze of the World
Review by Creasy007 ★★ 12

"News of value travels."
A tired western with fair performances that adds virtually nothing new to the genre, Paul Greengrass' 'News of the World' features a patriarchal Tom Hanks as an ex-captain, one who is paid to travel from town to town to read the news to the locals, who now finds himself traveling across vast distances to return a mysterious girl with Indian ties to her home. Due to a rough language barrier, the duo slowly but surely warm to one another while simultaneously teaching each other and employing their own methods of communication in the hopes of survival and success.
At face value, it can be touching, but it's such a desperately hollow and at times farcical film…
Review by MK ★★★½ 1

This western by Paul Greengrass brings nothing new to the table but it's a slow burner adventure with another great performance by Tom Hanks.
Review by Two Cineasts ★★★½ 5

Film reviews in 22 sentences (or less)
Today: News from the World
"To move forward you must first remember."
(Helena Zengel as Johanna)
Hi everybody, Paul Greengrass with his amazing original Bourne Trilogy and Tom Hanks, his amazing filmography, talent, charisma, are absolutely favorites of us, but it was Helena Zengel who immediately made us interested in this 19th-century Western, based on the book of the same name. Her performance in the social drama System Crasher was, even if you don't consider the young age, breathtaking, literally, she delivered such a painful, raw, magnetic and visceral execution of a sadly realistic, and not as uncommon as we would wish in our society, situation of a child who is not fitting…

Recent reviews

Review by twhite314 ★★★

steady paced but never boring, tom hanks continues his reign as everyones paternal figure, in a film suited to him. your dad will love it.
for fans of a long journey, the joys of storytelling, and texas.
Review by Jason Peters ★★★★

Solid film. Reminds me of the old Hollywood saying regarding the criteria of a good movie: "Three good scenes, no bad scenes." I do think Hanks was miscast, not bad but I think the role and film would've benefitted from someone with a bit weightier persona.
Review by Dan Heaton ★★★★

This one really snuck up on me and is a real gem! The action centerpiece builds the tension so well too. It’s such a sweet, well-deserved ending for both characters. The main relationship drives the movie, and Hanks is at his best.
Review by Nick Perronteau ★★★½

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

"And now on to federal news..."
*Collective groans*
I see much hasn't changed
Review by Paul Young ★★½

Breaking news! Tom Hanks still taking paint-by-numbers dramas that many will yawn through on an airplane!
Review by Paul Devine ★★★

it's a no thrills ye olde Western drama. Tom Hanks is fantastic as usual bogged down by his ghosts of his past, it just tipped its toe into a generic storyline a bit often to give a higher score
Review by Suskie ★★

I don't know if there are really THAT many story about a grizzled guy with a troubled past bonding with a mysterious young girl and learning to love again, but Logan and The Last of Us are two of the most widely celebrated pieces of media of the last decade, and thus this weak (albeit handsomely shot) film has a hard time justifying its existence beyond a shoehorned-in political statement about Trumpism and fake news.
Turns weirdly funny when the movie reached the 40-minute mark and realizes that there's no tension, so suddenly there are child molestors??? And they get taken out by the world's most comically CGI boulder?????
Review by Tim Schwagel ★★★

Coming from the guy that gave us the "I Am The Captain Now" meme I expected many more memeable moments in this.
What's the point of a movie if we can't harvest relatable web content from it?
Review by Ramana Gorle ★★★★

Very good
Review by Brian Collis ★★★½

This is totally what Tom Hanks would have done had Tom Hanks lived in 1870 and been able to Tom Hanks his way through his Tom Hanks life.
This movie was enjoyable. But those last 10 minutes took this from a forgettable picture to something pretty cool. A western tale worthy of the News itself.
Review by drishyan ★★★½

a gentle western drama with a heartfelt performance by Hanks and a change of pace for director Paul Greengrass after the Bourne series.
Review by Kumarshivam Singh ★★★

getting back to watching cinema again with the world's okayest movie