Robert Pattinson’s mouth expressions are dizzying to behold.

Robert Pattinson threw himself into this performance, as is to be expected, and his Hansen is intense, somewhat maniacal, and undeniably sinister. Primetime is sticky; it’s uncomfortable; it’s like cleaning the hair out of the drain – you’re interested in what you find but you know it’s probably going to make you feel a little sick. 

Centred around Chris Hansen, who is increasingly stretched thin by the pressures of broadcast competition, Primetime captures a unique era of television history. The mid-noughties, the broadcasting Wild West where a stiff man in a suit can have a signature ‘Have a seat’, spoken to a suspected child predator, as a catchphrase. We follow as To Catch A Predator makes the jump to prime time television, a rise that ups the stakes and therefore the pressure on the team to ‘catch’ more box office predators in order to compete with major ratings players such as Lost.There’s a twitchy element to Robert Pattinson’s portrayal of Chris Hansen. We see Chris repeating the lines that these adults have sent to those they believe to be children as he waits to confront them, almost as a nervous tick, practicing his introduction in the mirror. Combined with the low light and intense cinematography, these scenes become unsettling, but the cartoonish nature of Hansen’s individual quirks occasionally offers darkly humorous moments too. Also, I must say, Robert Pattinson’s mouth expressions are dizzying to behold.

The foil to Pattinson’s Chris Hansen comes in the form of Skyler Gisondo’s Dan Plum, or ‘Decoy Dan’, hired by Hansen and the team to portray underage decoy children before Hansen can swoop in with his signature interrogation. Skyler brings a bubbly effervescence to Dan’s character, who we meet as a musical-theatre-loving budding actor, but who becomes sullen and, by the looks of things, somewhat traumatised by the nature of his role in the television stings, which casts an even darker shadow over the ethical practices of To Catch A Predator. Portraying the other decoy, Del Harvey, is Phoebe Bridgers, who makes an impressive acting debut playing the versatile decoy working for Perverted-Justice, who raises concerns over ethical issues involved in how the team ramps up its methods.

It’s a film where the stress dial steadily turns upward as we move on, and it begins to leave a mark on the increasingly volatile Hansen, and in turn on his producer, Andie Bender, played excellently by Merritt Wever. The often-aghast producer bounces off Pattinson's skittishness, while being somewhat uncompromising and cutthroat herself. As the tension increases, we head towards the final episode of To Catch A Predator, one that requires no artistic embellishment to dramatise given the events that took place.

Where Lance Oppenheim excels with Primetime is to create this moody, humid, and uncomfortable atmosphere throughout the film, and establish a sour tone that the show and its subject area warrants. I’d have liked to see some elements of the show investigated further, or for them to spend longer on the specific episodes and cases that they highlight, but engaging performances and effective cinematography create a thrilling yet uncomfortable retelling of how Chris Hansen and Dateline NBC blurred, or more accurately, incinerated the lines between entertainment, investigative journalism, and law enforcement. You can see Primetime in UK cinemas on 30 October.