Clemency is a devastating drama with amazing performances at its heart
LIFE and death are confirmed by lastminute telephone calls in Clemency, a quietly devastating drama told through the eyes of a death row inmate bound for the chamber and a long-serving warden, who must remain emotionally detached until the final injection of potassium chloride stops heart function.
Writer-director Chinonye Chukwu wanders the same echoing corridors as Dead Man Walking, The Green Mile and Just Mercy, exploring different facets of the American criminal justice system.
Her second feature is emboldened by a fearless central performance from Alfre Woodard as the sleep-deprived warden, who is as much a prisoner of her hulking facility as the hundreds of men in her care.
Over the course of two riveting hours, Woodard chips away at her character’s armour, which she wears to protect against visible twinges of doubt, until trickles of saltwater break through and smear her unmovable, cold facade. Her omission from this year’s Oscar nominations was an injustice.
Aldis Hodge also delicately reaches into our chests to rip out our hearts with a measured supporting performance as a prisoner, who has always pleaded his innocence.
In one horrifying sequence, he repeatedly pounds his forehead against a wall, determined to seize control of his destiny once hope of a stay of execution has been extinguished.
“I say when I die!” he screams forlornly as guards race into the blood-smeared cell to restrain him.
Chukwu opens to sobering and gut-wrenching effect with the bungled execution of Victor Jimenez (Alex Castillo).
The first injection of midazolam is supposed to render Jimenez unconscious but the prisoner fits violently as his parents and invited guests watch in wide-eyed horror through glass from an adjacent room.
Warden Bernadine Williams (Woodard) is haunted by Jimenez’s final moments, writhing in agony on a gurney, and she repeatedly seeks solace in a local bar rather than in the arms of her
BASED on the book of the same title written by Thomas Wheeler and illustrated by Frank Miller, Cursed is a reimagining of Arthurian legend, with a teenage heroine at the centre of the action.
Nimue (Katherine Langford) is an outcast in her Druid village, which lies in a kingdom ruled by corrupt King Uther. The monarch’s merciless army of Red Paladins charges into Nimue’s village and slaughters men, women and children. Nimue escapes with an ancient sword, which her mother Lenore (Catherine Walker) entrusts her to deliver to legendary sorcerer Merlin (Gustaf Skarsgard).
As Nimue treks across England, she encounters dashing mercenary Arthur (Devon Terrell), who promises to help her on the epic quest.
■ 10 episodes, streaming from July 17. husband Jonathan (Wendell Pierce).
“I don’t see how it’s going to work living with an empty shell of a wife,” he pleads. “I need a pulse, Bernadine. I need to know you’re still here.”
His wife coolly prepares for the execution of prisoner Anthony Woods (Hodge), who has served 15 years for the murder of a police officer but has always asserted that his accomplice pulled the trigger.
Lawyer Marty Lumetta (Richard Schiff ) hopes the governor might weigh up the evidence and grant Woods clemency.
“I am going to fight for him right up to the moment you stick that needle in his arm,” Marty snarls at Bernadine, “Just so you know.”
Clemency is a powerful character study, which delivers its knockout blows in prolonged silences on both sides of the sliding bars.
A telephone call between Woods and his estranged ex-girlfriend (Danielle Brooks) pulses with unvarnished raw emotion but it’s Woodard who inevitably sears into the memory.
A three-minute close-up of her face finally registering everything we have been feeling, her posture perceptibly sagging as the piercing scream of a flatline on a heart monitor steadily increases in volume, is almost unbearable.
STANA KATIC reprises her role as FBI Agent Emily Byrne in the intriguing crime drama.
This series, Emily is determined to be the best mother possible to young son Flynn (Patrick McAuley) as she serves out the final days of her suspension from the agency. She is drawn back into the fold earlier than anticipated when the fate of her ex-husband, Special Agent Nick Durand (Patrick Heusinger), hangs in the balance during an international criminal case.
Emily’s superiors are reluctant to intervene so she takes matters into her own hands. Special Agent Cal Isaac (Matthew Le Nevez) is dispatched to neutralise Emily’s interference before she uncovers a larger conspiracy.
■ 10 episodes, streaming from July 17.