I finally watched Mountainhead a few months after it premiered on the 2025 movie schedule, and I can’t quite figure out if it’s the funniest or scariest movie I’ve seen all year. Immediately after the shocking Mountainhead ending and while I was coming to terms with its implications for the billionaire characters with no self-awareness or shame played by its star-studded cast, I kept going back and forth: Is this funnier or scarier?
After thinking on it a good while, I’ve come to the realization that this dynamic makes this movie about four tech billionaires having a mountain retreat as the world burns around them (a result of their actions) so much better. Let me explain…
On One Hand, It’s A Satirical Comedy That Doesn’t Hold Back
Okay, so what makes Mountainhead so funny? For starters, Jesse Armstrong’s satirical comedy doesn’t hold back with its depiction of billionaires as self-centered, cartoonishly ruthless, and sociopathic man-children who’re obsessed with power, control, and a growing net worth. The Succession creator is a little less subtle in his views of the 1% here than he was with his insanely popular series that ended a couple of years ago, and it works. In fact, it works really well.
The unfathomably wealthy characters played by Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman, Ramy Youssef, and Corey Michael Smith are so out of touch, absurd, and unlikable (even Youssef’s Jeff Abredazi, who we’re supposed to be rooting for) that it makes this a hilarious and pointed character study that doesn’t hold back. It’s shocking at times, but never not funny.
On The Other, It’s A Terrifying Thriller That’s Way Too Relevant In Today’s Times
Though Mountainhead is undeniably hilarious with its deception of billionaires and the lengths they’ll go through to obtain more power, wealth, and even immortality in the case of one character, this movie is also incredibly terrifying. Even before we get the whole “Kill Jeff so we can take his company and make ourselves richer” part that makes this feel less like The Big Short and more like The Shining, this movie is full of scary shit.
From Ven Parish’s (Smith) social company developing deepfake technology that is impossible to vet, to the world literally going to hell beneath the mountain and Randall Garrett (Carell) trying to become “transhuman” so he can live forever, a lot is going on. What makes it all the scarier is that everything happening isn’t too far off from real life. We’re pretty much there (except for the whole uploaded consciousness thing).
This Mixture Of Tones Gives The Best Of Both Worlds
This is one of the best movies on HBO Max, and that’s mostly due to the way it finds that perfect balance between comedy and terror. I originally kept going back and forth about whether this movie was funnier than it was scary, or the other way around, but now I see them as complementary to each other, which creates something fun, fresh, and unique.
This mixture of tones gives the best of both worlds, which makes Mountainhead so much fun to watch. It’s never too terrifying because there’s some wild scene or hilarious joke that breaks up the tension, and it’s never too funny as that dose of reality quickly kicks in at times. It just works!