US attorney Ken Feinberg is the person responsible for compensating victims of many of America’s most tragic events, including the devastation wrought by Agent Orange, the BP oil spill, Sandy Hook, and 9/11, with his most recent case involving a group of pensioners who are being unfairly gouged by a government plan to cut their payments by up to 60 per cent. This rigorous documentary explores Feinberg’s unenviable position of having to place a financial value on human lives and justifying the differing amounts paid out. With his days haunted by tragedy, Feinberg, who is stoic throughout, takes refuge at night in the high arts of music and cinema. Playing God offers a fascinating and humanising portrait of this complicated but necessary position in an intensely capitalist society.