The Big Picture

Esmail brings the powerlessness of Mr. Robot to a larger scale in Leave the World Behind, immersing viewers in a rapidly crumbling world with no hope. The performances in the film, particularly by Julia Roberts, Ethan Hawke, and Mahershala Ali, lend depth to the characters and make the insular story compelling. Esmail’s script and directing create a heightened sense of terror, with disconcerting angles and camerawork that make the home-based scenes just as exciting as the outside world’s chaos.

For four seasons of Mr. Robot, creator Sam Esmail followed Elliot Alderson (Rami Malek), a hacker who can disrupt society, whether by erasing debt or potentially blowing up a nuclear power plant. Throughout the series, we saw both the power that an individual could have, but also how helpless we truly are in a world outside of our control. In Esmail’s second feature film, Leave the World Behind, based on the Rumaan Alam book of the same name, Esmail confronts that helplessness and the feeling that no one is in control on a much larger scale, throwing us into a world falling rapidly apart and with seemingly no hope for resuscitation.

Leave the World Behind A family’s getaway to a luxurious rental home takes an ominous turn when a cyberattack knocks out their devices, and two strangers appear at their door. Release Date November 22, 2023 Director Sam Esmail Cast Julia Roberts, Denzel Washington, Ethan Hawke, Kevin Bacon, Mahershala Ali Genres Drama

What Is ‘Leave the World Behind’ About?

Julia Roberts and Ethan Hawke star as Amanda and Clay Sandford, a couple who decide to leave New York City for the weekend with their kids Rose and Archie (Farrah Mackenzie and Charlie Evans) to have an impromptu vacation on Long Island. With the exception of poor cell service and a surprise on the beach, the vacation is going nicely, until one night, G.H. Scott (Mahershala Ali)—the owner of the house they’ve rented—and his daughter Ruth (Myha’la) ask if they can stay the night, stating that there’s been a blackout in the city. Reluctantly, the Sandford family lets them in, and together, the families come to realize the blackout might be a greater threat than they originally thought.

Esmail makes Leave the World Behind feel like an end-of-the-world drama on a small scale without ever negating the stakes of this scenario. The majority of Leave the World Behind takes place within the confines of Scott’s rental house, but Esmail always makes us keenly aware of the dangers going on throughout the world. We get glimpses of the dangers on a staticky television, brief excursions outside the home hint at the confusion going on in the world, and the unusual way the animals nearby the house act show that something very odd is occurring. The Sandford and Scott families are attempting to piece together what is happening, and Esmail does an excellent job of putting us in their shoes as we also try to gather what we can from the world presented to us.

‘Leave the World Behind’ Works Because of the Characters and Performances
Image via Netflix

Because of the insular nature of this story, Leave the World Behind relies on the performances within this home. Esmail’s script never gives us unnecessary details about these characters we wouldn’t gleam from the day-to-day interactions of this family, and any information feels naturally communicated. For example, we don’t learn what G.H. Scott does until it’s integral to the story at hand. While this can lead to these characters sometimes feeling one-note, this still doesn’t stop the performances from bringing a richness to the situation.

Roberts is quite fun playing against type, starting the film by saying “I fucking hate people,” then showing her distrust throughout. She’s cautious, but understandably so given the circumstances. Hawke embraces a sort of cool dad/college professor aesthetic that goes well with him, while Myha’la is great at cutting through the bullshit of the tension between these two families. But it’s Ali who is fascinating here, and as an outsider made to feel uncomfortable in his own house, Scott has to handle each moment with great care and consideration. He knows the way things must look from the eyes of the Sandford family, and he attempts to seem as unthreatening and forgiving as he can be—all while holding the weight of knowing more about what is going on than he originally lets on. Ali is always great at being the most interesting character in the room in any room he’s in and that’s absolutely the case in Leave the World Behind.

While these characters might seem a bit straightforward, it’s how these people interact that makes Leave the World Behind work so well. From the moment Amanda meets G.H., she’s uncertain about trusting him, but as the film goes on, we see how this changes and reverts. Leave the World Behind’s most captivating scenes follow Amanda and G.H. as they attempt to know each other better, leading to an intense story from G.H., which is then followed by a lovely moment of respite where the two dance to Next’s “Too Close”. Esmail is always cognizant of how these characters would act in this new world, whether it’s desperate for answers and help, or longing for some sense of normalcy and fun (Rose’s story primarily revolves around attempting to finish her Friends binge by finally watching the last episode, despite the internet being down) while all hell breaks loose.

Sam Esmail’s Script and Directing Heighten ‘Leave the World Behind’
Image via Netflix

All of this precariousness is explained through Esmail’s camera, which is full of awkward, disconcerting angles, often flipping the world on its head and heightening the terror. Esmail used similar tactics in Mr. Robot and they’re equally effective here. He often attempts to give us scenes of action, and while these mostly work well, it’s the camerawork and solid adaptation of Alam’s novel that makes the moments at home, where discussions and theories fly, just as exciting as the brief, thrilling scenes in the outside world.

Esmail mostly keeps the truth of what is happening a mystery, and in some ways, he also leaves it up to the audience what the larger point of Leave the World Behind is. At first, it seems, as we see the conflict between Amanda not wanting to let the Scott family in, that this will be an exploration of race, but this is mostly brushed off by the end of the first act. Is Leave the World Behind a story about environmental dangers, a political statement on the divide our country has taken, or simply an example of how easy it would be to throw the world into chaos? Or—more likely—all of the above? Esmail never gives the answers simply, which makes the deeper conversations about this film even more stimulating.

Leave the World Behind is a smart, compelling take on the end of the world, and proves Esmail is a writer-director who deserves larger-scale projects like this after his television successes. Maybe no one today is better at showing the world destroying itself quite like Sam Esmail.

Rating: B+

Leave the World Behind is now playing in limited theaters and will be available to stream on Netflix in the U.S. on December 8.

WATCH ON NETFLIX