Director Kevin Macdonald successfully revives the 1970s-style paranoid thriller with
State of Play, a taut and assured reworking of the 2003 BBC series of the same name. Paring down the original six-hour series to a lean 127 minutes, Macdonald and screenwriters Matthew Michael Carnahan, Tony Gilroy, and Billy Ray barely give the audience a moment to breathe as a veteran reporter and a doe-eyed blogger race through the streets of Washington, D.C., to uncover an ominous political conspiracy.
The story gets under way with two seemingly unrelated incidents: the morning after a low-level drug dealer and a pizza deliveryman are gunned down in a dark alley,...
Released:
2009
Rated:
PG-13
Length:
127 mins