Kathryn Bigelow Is Back: New Netflix Thriller Drops in October
After eight years off the grid, Kathryn Bigelow is officially back — and she's not easing in. Her new film, now titled A House of Dynamite, will premiere on Netflix October 24, following a limited theatrical run.
This is the same project that's been floating around as the mysterious "Untitled White House Thriller" — and it's exactly what it sounds like. The film unfolds in real time as the White House responds to incoming ballistic missiles headed for U.S. soil. So, yes, Bigelow's doing what Bigelow does best: high-stakes panic under pressure, no time to breathe, no room for fluff.
The script comes from Noah Oppenheim, former NBC News president and screenwriter of Jackie, and it's been described as a "hot script" — Hollywood code for "this one actually made people read past page 10."
The cast? Stacked.
You've got Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson, Greta Lee, Anthony Ramos, Tracy Letts, Jason Clarke, Kaitlyn Dever, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Moses Ingram, Brian Tee, Jonah Hauer-King, and Kyle Allen. It's an ensemble built to yell into phones, pace dramatically, and deliver exposition like their lives depend on it. Which they probably do.
Bigelow hasn't directed a film since Detroit in 2017, but her resume speaks for itself — The Hurt Locker, Zero Dark Thirty, Point Break, Near Dark, and the criminally underseen Strange Days. She was the first woman to win the Best Director Oscar, and for a while, she was untouchable. Then… silence.
Now at 73, she's stepping back in with a film that's reportedly tonally closer to Zero Dark Thirty than Point Break, so expect intensity, realism, and probably at least one scene that will give you a stress headache.
The October 24 Netflix release puts it squarely in awards season, and with that cast, that premise, and Bigelow at the helm, it's pretty clear Netflix has Oscar ambitions here.