<p class="bodytext">Kathryn Bigelow specialises in dread. Of the low, humming sort. Never in your face, but you can feel the terror pulsing away somewhere within you. Remember 'The Hurt Locker' (2008)? Or even 'Zero Dark Thirty' (2012)? Her latest, 'A House of Dynamite', has her signature all over it. This is a political thriller that treats the familiar premise of an imminent nuclear strike on the United States with unusual restraint. And therein lies its triumph and its weakness. </p>.<p class="bodytext">The film is 18 minutes of impending doom replayed from several perspectives — not exactly a Rashomon effect but bold nonetheless. It works quite brilliantly till it does not. By the time you reach the last half hour, the tension weakens to only pick up in the last 10 minutes or so.</p>.<p class="bodytext">This is not your garden variety "Go! Go! Go!" thriller. The action occurs in sterile situation rooms and consoles. There are no blazing guns or exploding bombs — only protocol and procedure that create a sense of bleak, inevitable urgency. Idris Elba is pitch-perfect as the relatively new president caught between duty and despair, while the rest of the ensemble cast does a solid job, too. </p>.<p class="bodytext">The repetitive loops do fray your patience, but if you forgive this conceit, the film is a cautionary tale that feels terribly real and unreal at the same time. And there is no closure, and that's not a spoiler — the 'ending' is a mirror held to the house of dynamite we all reside in. A hat tip to the terrific background score. </p>
<p class="bodytext">Kathryn Bigelow specialises in dread. Of the low, humming sort. Never in your face, but you can feel the terror pulsing away somewhere within you. Remember 'The Hurt Locker' (2008)? Or even 'Zero Dark Thirty' (2012)? Her latest, 'A House of Dynamite', has her signature all over it. This is a political thriller that treats the familiar premise of an imminent nuclear strike on the United States with unusual restraint. And therein lies its triumph and its weakness. </p>.<p class="bodytext">The film is 18 minutes of impending doom replayed from several perspectives — not exactly a Rashomon effect but bold nonetheless. It works quite brilliantly till it does not. By the time you reach the last half hour, the tension weakens to only pick up in the last 10 minutes or so.</p>.<p class="bodytext">This is not your garden variety "Go! Go! Go!" thriller. The action occurs in sterile situation rooms and consoles. There are no blazing guns or exploding bombs — only protocol and procedure that create a sense of bleak, inevitable urgency. Idris Elba is pitch-perfect as the relatively new president caught between duty and despair, while the rest of the ensemble cast does a solid job, too. </p>.<p class="bodytext">The repetitive loops do fray your patience, but if you forgive this conceit, the film is a cautionary tale that feels terribly real and unreal at the same time. And there is no closure, and that's not a spoiler — the 'ending' is a mirror held to the house of dynamite we all reside in. A hat tip to the terrific background score. </p>