Lost in Flames
Paul Greengrass is a filmmaker with great dramatic instincts who’s found himself consistently undervalued because of his choices of subject material. While Greengrass crafted two of the best franchise films of the 21st century with his Bourne sequels, he followed them up with several historical dramas that depicted recent tragedies; United 93 was a 9/11 film less than a decade after the attack, Captain Phillips restaged a traumatic terrorist hijacking, and July 22 brutally explored a mass shooting in Norway. Even Greengrass’ more commercial prospects were hit with bad luck. His military drama Green Zone happened to coincide with real-life revelations about the Bush administration’s activity in Iraq that turned discourse about the film into political rhetoric; conversely, Jason Bourne, the mainstream legacy sequel to the original trilogy ended up being the worst film of Greengrass’ career. Greengrass’ second-most recent endeavor, News of the World, would’ve had breakout potential had it not been released in December 2020, when a majority of theaters were shut down.
The Lost Bus, Greengrass’ 2025 historical drama, was given a diplomatic one-week theatrical release by Apple TV for the sake of awards consideration, even if no serious “for your consideration” campaigns were launched; that the film landed an Academy Award nomination for Best Visual Effects may be a result of the lackluster VFX work in last year’s blockbuster titles. Apple TV had essentially forgone the theatrical business entirely after Argylle, Napoleon, Fly Me To The Moon, and even good films, like Killers of the Flower Moon, all flopped. Although Apple Original Films scored a rare win when F1 became one of the year’s 10 highest-grossing releases, its success has been more attributed to Warner Bros., which provided distribution for the racing drama.
The Lost Bus is the type of immersive, visceral experience that would be best witnessed on the big screen, but its subject material may have been too grim for Apple to ever consider giving it a wide release. Set during the 2018 Camp Fire in Northern California's Butte County, the deadliest in state history, The Lost Bus is the story of Kevin McCay (Matthew McConaughey), a school bus driver who transported 22 children to a drop-off zone for their parents to pick up. Upon his realization that the area would soon become engulfed in flames, McCay made the decision to drive through the fire to get the entire class to safety. Cursory research into the true story would reveal that all the children survived, but it doesn’t make the imagery of The Lost Bus any less horrific.
The Lost Bus is a “man on a mission” film, but Greengrass is able to put McCay’s bravery in the right context. His involvement in the rescue was prompted by a desperate plea to have more shifts during a period where public school teacher jobs were judiciously cut; the heroism isn’t negated, but McCay is framed as a common man who stepped up, and not a larger-than-life savior. The film’s Oscar-nominated effects are legitimately unprecedented in their depiction of the gradual process in which wildfires are sparked and become unwieldy; flames don’t evolve in the way that cinema has taught viewers to think that they do, and it takes Greengrass time to correct those presumptions. The laborious exploration of the chemical science is critical to the authenticity of the film’s escalation; despite the imagery lifted directly from archive footage of the fires, The Lost Bus’ aesthetics would seem just as stylized as Mad Max to those unfamiliar with what really happened.
What may have prevented The Lost Bus from being launched by Apple as a major “inspirational true story” event is Greengrass’ rejection, and perhaps defiance, of commercial sensibilities. McCay’s ordeal isn’t defined by dramatic swerves or emotional breakdowns because the survival of his passengers is an arduous process. To slowly paddle through a thick sea of chaos isn’t as exciting as a CNN recap of the same events, and there’s little room for self-reflection whilst McCay’s isolated from outside communication. Greengrass also isn’t keen to politicize the events; while there are a few references to deforestation and environmental damage within the closing credits, none of the characters have time to point fingers in the midst of a catastrophe. The most pointed statement in The Lost Bus is the assertion that there were others, like McCay, who were faced with impossible stakes, yet weren’t able to return home safely.
As is the case with any film that’s claimed to be “based on a true story,” The Lost Bus is a work of drama, and not a non-fictional presentation. One of McCay’s fellow drivers is omitted from the film as a result of the subject’s wishes, and it’s not hard to see how quintessential archetypes are impressed upon the younger characters, whose backgrounds were kept vague for the sake of privacy. Greengrass’ inventions would seemingly be to honor the stark reality of the situational dangers that those in McCay’s position face, rather than their specific personal histories. However, it does mean that the family drama is particularly tiresome, especially with McConaughey’s real son Levi cast as his on-screen child.
The Lost Bus might be better described as an "underseen curiosity” than a “hidden classic,” but it’s disappointing that a film so audacious was relegated to the small screen, where it was lost within a broader streaming library.