Wim Wenders isn't a name associated with scifi despite at least 3 of his films being set in the future with plots revolving around futuristic gadgets. His scifi flicks fly under the radar because they don't dwell on spaceships & pew-pew "lasers". Instead they focus on normal human situations that happen to revolve around some futuristic McGuffin. And go figure, many of these futuristic devices actually became reality. The most chilling device is from this movie.

In 1991's Until the End of the World he perfectly predicted the talking GPS, if not the smartphone itself, with amazing accuracy. I would say his 1984 masterpiece Paris, Texas predicted the now viral phenomenon of video sex camgirls. But by far the most chilling scifi device he predicted was drone warfare here in 1997's End of Violence.

Unless you've been living in a cave you've probably seen drone footage of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Just like in this 1997 movie, we see a mechanical, birds-eye view of the target, often in pixellated thermal imaging just like in this movie, then with the click of a mouse--bloop--the target drops dead. This is certainly the new face of warfare from now on: efficient, clean, emotionless like playing a videogame.

The chilling result is, just like the movie implies, you sit watching drone footage of soldiers (er, targets) getting blown up and you lose all connection with humanity, you forget the real horror and pain of violence. The end of 'violence' indeed.

I think this is one of Wim's darkest films. Granted, drones are not being regularly used by the secret police to kill citizens like in the movie, but geez, seeing the efficiency of this method on the battlefield, we sense it's just a matter of time. How that affects us as a society, I guess we'll see.

Bottom line: incredibly underrated, prescient film, bears a 2nd watch now that it's "current," 25 years later.