Netflix has a brutal new action movie and it's got an incredible 95% Rotten Tomatoes score

Last month, we said the trailer for Rebel Ridge made it look like the best Netflix action film of the year.

It’s out now on Netflix, and it seems we may not have been far off the mark, as Rebel Ridge currently has a 95% fresh Rotten Tomatoes rating.

What’s it about? Comparisons to classic action movie Rambo are almost unavoidable with this one.

Aaron Pierre stars as Terry Richmond, a former marine who uncovers a web of law enforcement corruption when he tries to bail his cousin out of jail. He ends up butting heads with police chief Sandy Burnne, played by Don Johnson, with spectacularly action-packed results.

The bit that really got our attention, though, was hearing Rebel Ridge is Jeremy Saulnier’s latest project. He directed the fantastic (and brutal) Green Room and Blue Ruin.

It’s not a short film, at 131 minutes, but the reviewers say Rebel Ridge manages to keep up the tension and that sense of being truly action-packed.

IGN’s 8/10 review sums things up nicely: “It’s what a modern crowd-pleaser should be: smart, gripping, and about something.”

The RogerEbert.com review has a 3.5/4 score, and calls it “a reminder of how thrilling it can be to see a genre piece with this level of artistry.”

The Guardian’s 4/5 review says Rebel Ridge is “electrifying” and that Saulnier “squeezes in more clammy suspense than most thrillers I’ve seen in the past year.”

Empire gave the film 4/5 too saying that while it’s not terribly original, it is a “satisfying, substantial genre piece that, despite its forgettable title, is well worth remembering.”

This isn’t just a case of most reviews just flopping over the 6/10 score Rotten Tomatoes requires for a “fresh” write-up, either. Metacritic, which provides a truer average of review scores, has Rebel Ridge sat at a strong 78%.

There’s just one outlier review we can’t help but mention.

The Hollywood Reporter didn’t get on with Rebel Ridge at all, calling it “cliche-ridden” and as flat as a “horizontal line.” Ouch.

Why mention the bad review? Coming to a movie with unfairly high expectations doesn’t help anyone. But we think 95% of you will have a good time with this one.

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