GAMES
HYPER LIGHT DRIFTER
ALL PLATFORMS
An early contender for most beautiful game of 2016, Hyper Light Drifter finds you controlling a tiny man with a sword adrift in a ruined land depicted in a riot of oversized pixels. Its look evokes "platformers" of old - deliberately blocky, with a crude, top-down, point of view - but amped up with incredible colour and scale. The story is neither here nor there - basically, you explore and fight things - but the enjoyment really lies in making your way into one stunning environment after the next, then figuring out the path forward. It has echoes of Monument (the phone puzzler that was one of the best games of 2015) and 2001's Ico, where you guided a similarly little chap through a similarly ruined landscape. Creative, ethereal and highly recommended. AH
CLASSIC
SILVER LODE
VCI, UNRATED
Allan Dwan's gripping 1954 Western unfolds in something close to "real time" as a band of supposed lawmen arrive in the town of Silver Lode to arrest the hero Dan Ballard (John Payne, suggesting a sullen cousin of Jimmy Stewart) during celebrations for the fourth of July. Dan denies the charges, but when his friends turn against him he's forced to fight for his life, while racing across town in search of sanctuary. Some critics have interpreted this as an allegory for the anti-Communist witch hunts of the era, not unreasonably given that the screenwriter Karen deWolf was blacklisted soon after. More significantly, the film is a showcase for Dwan's genius for mapping out action sequences, which marks him as a precursor to Hong Kong's Johnnie To: power dynamics illustrated through compositions in depth, characters moving between contrasted adjoining spaces or disappearing into hiding spots just offscreen. Dwan, like To, is frank in his use of stock situations and types — all the better to reduce the plot to an unsettlingly arbitrary diagram that can be redrawn from one sequence to the next. JW
DVD
GLENGARRY GLEN ROSS
UMBRELLA, M
The real-estate business was never as cut-throat as in David Mamet's Pulitzer-winning play, brought to the screen in James Foley's all-star 1992 production, which resembles a war movie where sprays of obscene language substitute for machine-gun fire. The characters are a crew of desperate salesmen willing to do whatever it takes to clinch a deal; collectively they exist in a kind of hell, but the theoretical gloom is offset by the sheer brio of the cast, including Jack Lemmon as a craven has been, Kevin Spacey as a despised office manager, Alec Baldwin as a gung-ho motivational speaker, and Al Pacino as the alpha male of the group. Foley adds his own brand of visual pizzazz, punching home Mamet's dialogue rhythms with circling camera movements and rapid back-and-forth cutting. Keeping a distance from realism, he gives the first act in particular the heightened atmosphere of film noir: rain streams down glass, trains rattle through the night, and James Newton Howard's jazzy score underpins a series of declamatory scenes which, in acting terms, often seem like one flamboyant solo after another. JW
SERIES
SILICON VALLEY
ROADSHOW (SERIES TWO), MA15+
This tech-world comedy maintains the momentum from season one without missing a beat. While there is a lot of jargon about computers, it is really about how people – how they interact, how they solve problems, how they value loyalty (or don't). Cast as nerdy misfits backing a start-up company that has developed a sensational new product everybody is going to need, they are constantly exposed as normal human beings with poor social habits. It may be stereotypical, but it's funny as hell. They constantly get into awkward situations, and usually squirm out of them intact, the dream road to gaining financial support and making their product commercially successful, still in front of them. The ensemble of Thomas Middleditch, TJ Miller, Amanda Crews, Martin Starr, Kumail Nanjiani and Zach Woods is powerfully zany. Matt, as Gavin Belson, their evil archrival, is equally as good. Guest appearances throughout from the likes of Silicon Valley celebs like Eric Schmidt, Jason Kincaid, Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss. The show is already into its third season, so rest assured the ride isn't over yet. JK
FREE-TO-AIR
BROAD CITY
MAY 5, ABC2, 10PM
If you haven't seen Broad City yet - either in its original form as a web series, or this Comedy Channel incarnation, co-produced by Amy Poehler - now's the time to catch up. Chronicling the lives of two broke 20-something best friends, Abbi (Abbi Jacobsen) and Ilana (Ilana Glazer) - who created the series - in New York, Broad City is sharper and cruder than Girls (plus it actually features characters who are likeable), the storylines of which feel affected compared to the almost zero narrative arc here. Tonight's episode see the Abbi and Ilana - who smoke lots of pot, drink, and enjoy casual sex - trying to scrape together cash for a pop-up Lil Wayne concert, no matter how much they need to demean themselves. This is female-centric comedy with a difference, one of the best shows of its genre in recent years. KN
