Rust (2024 film)

Rust is a 2024 American Western film directed by Joel Souza, starring Alec Baldwin as the outlaw Harland Rust, who breaks his 13-year-old grandson out of jail in 1880s Wyoming and flees with him toward Mexico. The film is inseparable from its production history: on October 21, 2021, during a rehearsal near Santa Fe, New Mexico, a live round discharged from a revolver Baldwin was holding killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounded Souza.¹ Production resumed in 2023 in Montana with a new cinematographer, Bianca Cline, and the completed film premiered in Poland in November 2024 before a small theatrical and streaming release in May 2025.^{2 • 3}

Story and cast

The film is set in 1882 in Wyoming. Lucas Hollister, a thirteen-year-old farmhand raising his younger brother after their parents' death, accidentally shoots and kills a rancher named Charles Gantry and is convicted of murder and sentenced to hang. He is broken out of jail by Harland Rust, a notorious outlaw who turns out to be his estranged grandfather. The pair flee toward Mexico, where Rust has arranged a safe place and schooling for the boy, pursued by a sheriff's posse and competing bounty hunters, chief among them the brutal Fenton "Preacher" Lang (Travis Fimmel).^{2 • 4}

Baldwin holds a shared story credit in addition to starring and producing. Reviewers singled out the supporting cast, including Frances Fisher as Rust's sister and Josh Hopkins as the lawman Wood Helm.⁴

The 2021 shooting

Rust was announced in May 2020, with Baldwin as producer and star and a story he developed with Souza.⁹ Filming began near Santa Fe, New Mexico, in early October 2021. On October 21, 2021, during a rehearsal, a live round discharged from a revolver used by Baldwin, killing the 42-year-old cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounding Souza, who was struck in the shoulder.^{1 • 8}

Investigators recovered six live rounds on the set, including the one that fired, in a box, a bandolier, a gun belt, and other locations, although live ammunition was expressly prohibited. A state regulators' report found the production company had no process for keeping live rounds off the set and had not given the armorer enough time to inventory ammunition; two earlier accidental discharges on set had gone unaddressed.^{10 • 9} In February 2023, Rust Movie Productions LLC settled workplace-safety citations with New Mexico's Occupational Health and Safety Bureau, agreeing to pay $100,000, the largest OSHA penalty in the state since 2010.¹

Legal outcomes

Three people faced criminal charges. Armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, responsible for the storage, maintenance, and handling of firearms and ammunition, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in March 2024 and sentenced to 18 months in prison.^{11 • 8} First assistant director Dave Halls, who handed Baldwin the gun, pleaded guilty to negligent use of a deadly weapon.⁸ Baldwin was charged with involuntary manslaughter, but the case was dismissed in July 2024 after his defense showed that police and prosecutors had withheld evidence from the defense.^{12 • 7}

Baldwin also reached a settlement with Hutchins's family, under which her widower, Matthew Hutchins, became an executive producer of the film.⁷

Completion and release

Filming resumed in 2023 at the Yellowstone Film Ranch in Montana with Bianca Cline as the new director of photography, working from Hutchins's notes to match the look she had established. Souza refashioned the story to eliminate the church scene in which the shooting occurred; some roles were recast and reshot, and in one case an actor's face was digitally painted into previously filmed takes.^{2 • 9}

The film had its world premiere in November 2024 at the Camerimage festival in Toruń, Poland, with a dedication to Hutchins; the choice of Poland, Hutchins's neighboring country to her native Ukraine, drew criticism from parts of the cinematography community, and Hutchins's mother, who was suing Baldwin and the production, refused to attend.³ Rust opened in a limited theatrical release and on video on demand on May 2, 2025, distributed by Falling Forward Films, and streams on Prime Video.⁴ The opening weekend gross was about $25,000 from 115 theaters.⁷ A documentary about Hutchins and the completion of the film, Last Take: Rust and the Story of Halyna, directed by her friend Rachel Mason, was released on Hulu.⁷

Reception

Critical response was mixed. The Rotten Tomatoes critics' consensus calls it "a middling drama overshadowed by tragic circumstances" that "boasts a handsome look but doesn't bring much distinctive flavor to the Western genre," and the film scored 56 percent from 50 reviews, with 69 percent among audiences.⁴ Metacritic recorded a Metascore of 46, in the mixed-or-average band.⁶

Nearly every review converges on one point: the cinematography is the film's strongest element. The Guardian wrote that Hutchins's work is "gorgeous" and the movie's saving grace; The Independent called it "an incredibly good-looking movie, rich in shadow and texture"; the San Francisco Chronicle described "a painterly display of light-starved cabin interiors, richly colored natural panoramas and noirish, Dutch-tilted frontier saloons."^{13 • 8 • 14} The Associated Press noted that the film closes with a dedication card reading "...for Halyna," with her name also given in Ukrainian and a quotation from her: "What can we do to make this better?"⁵

Criticism focused on length and structure. Reviewers described a long, slow, discursive narrative that is "unnecessarily repetitious," with thinly drawn characters, though several found Baldwin's gruff portrayal effective and the film better than its circumstances suggested.^{14 • 6 • 5} Commentators also debated the ethics of releasing the film at all; the Observer found the film's celebration of firearms jarring given the circumstances, while Hutchins's family publicly supported the release so that her work could be seen.^{4 • 7}

References

1. OHSB reaches settlement with Rust Movie Productions, LLC, New Mexico Environment Department (February 24, 2023)
2. The Making of "Rust" Was a Tragedy. Its Final Form Is a Missed Opportunity, The New Yorker (May 20, 2025)
3. Alec Baldwin film 'Rust' has world premiere with dedication to cinematographer killed on set, AP (November 2024)
4. Rust (2024), Rotten Tomatoes
5. Movie Review: 'Rust' is a serviceable Western, haunted throughout by its tragic offscreen history, AP (May 1, 2025)
6. Rust critic reviews, Metacritic
7. Alec Baldwin's 'Rust' Makes Just $25,000 From Limited Theatrical Release, TheWrap (May 4, 2025)
8. Rust review: Alec Baldwin's western caused a woman's tragic death, The Independent (May 2, 2025)
9. The 'Rust' Movie Set Shooting: Timeline, A&E
10. How did live ammunition get on Alec Baldwin's 'Rust' set? The armorer's trial will focus on this, AP (February 2024)
11. Alec Baldwin's deadly western 'Rust' finally makes it to the screen, Los Angeles Times (May 1, 2025)
12. Judge dismisses case against Alec Baldwin in "Rust" shooting, Axios (July 12, 2024)
13. Rust review – tragedy-marred Alec Baldwin western is a tough slog, The Guardian (May 1, 2025)
14. 'Rust' stuns with its visuals, but can it move beyond its tragedy?, San Francisco Chronicle (April 30, 2025)

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Action and adventure films (individual works) › Westerns, 1980 onward

Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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