I saw this 1975 film when it first came out under the English title of END OF THE GAME which literally describes what happens but is not nearly as appropriate as the original title of THE JUDGE & HIS HANGMAN. If you are familiar with Swiss playwright/novelist Friedrich Durrenmatt (THE VISIT, THE PHYSICISTS) then you know what to expect. Durrenmatt is like a Swiss Samuel Beckett with a little of Harold Pinter thrown in for good measure. On the surface this is a standard murder mystery that isn’t that hard to figure out. That isn’t the point. How it arrives at its solution, the past incident that drives it, and the neatly absurdist dialogue that the major characters exchange are what END OF THE GAME is really about.
Maximillian Schell, who is much better known for his acting, directed a handful of films of which this is undoubtedly the strangest. In fact it is splendidly strange. That is why it plays better today than it did then. Most Americans (certainly the reviewers) didn’t get it at all. The scene with Donald Sutherland as a corpse, his rain soaked funeral, and the verbal exchanges between Martin Ritt and Jon Voight and Ritt and Robert Shaw should have tipped them off. This is no ordinary run-of-the-mill mystery even if the murder turns out to have been extremely ordinary.
The movie is one of those international or Continental films that were so popular in the 1970s with a mixed cast of British, American, and European actors. Some of the dubbing leaves a lot to be desired and that is even true of the original German soundtrack but it doesn’t really detract from the proceedings. It actually adds to the strangeness as does the Ennio Morricone score. Jon Voight, Jacqueline Bisset and Robert Shaw were already well known performers but casting director Martin Ritt (who had acted early in his Actors Studio days) was definitely an eccentric move but Ritt acquits himself well. Schell himself makes a brief cameo appearance (playing the piano for Pinchas Zukerman) and there’s another cameo from silent screen star Lil Dagover (CABINET OF DR CALIGARI) as Shaw’s mother. Fittingly she doesn’t utter a word.
I have waited patiently for years for 20th Century Fox to release this title on home video but had to settle for a DVD-R copied off the Fox Movie Channel until now. As another reviewer pointed out, the lack of subtitles is unfortunate as it is clear there are substantial differences between the German and English soundtracks. I was able to access the special features on my Blu-Ray player but without subtitles I can’t understand what Maximillian Schell has to say about the film. Anyway, no matter where it comes from, I am delighted to have this in a more than respectable transfer with good sound. It has its flaws but it remains fascinating to watch
The Capsule Critic 