Endgame
Don’t let any stuffy associations with PBS’s Masterpiece keep you from Endgame (available for online viewing through 11.06). It’s tense drama, shot Paul Greengrass-style (hand-held and fast—riots! German shepherds! Dick Cheney William Hurt! Derek Jacobi in pinstripes!) The blown-out palette is reminiscent of Pitch Black, Man On Fire, and The Constant Gardener. If that’s an “intelligent thriller” look du jour, it seems appropriate for 1980s South Africa—sunburnt, take-your-breath scenic, cruel, terrifyingly violent, chokingly paranoid. The score, a mash of electronic bleeps, booms and burbles, worms its way appropriately under your skin (and occasionally cribs from John Powell’s Bourne soundtracks). Times review here.
