The Courier (2020)

In a genre that seemed obsolete at some point = cold war spy thrillers, surprisingly we still get new releases, not very frequent, but I think more often than for instance SciFi movies, Last year I was writing about "Jack Strong" inspired from a real case. We could say that "The Courier" is its prequel. The subject here is pretty much the same - a high ranking officer from the Eastern block decides that's more healthy for the good of the international politics of the time to start leaking classified info to the CIA. In "Jack Strong" the main character was a Polish officer, who in the beginning of the movie was attending the execution of colonel Penkovsky, an example given by KGB for the risks of collaborating with the capitalist enemy. Well (mega spoiler), here it's where the movies connect - Oleg Penkovsky is another real character, whose career as a spy is presented in "The Courier".

Now that we know the ending, what's left to be said is that the title character here is not Penkovsky, but the "courier" - Greville Wynne, an average businessman residing in London, unfortunately for him having plenty of customers in Eastern Europe, but fortunately perfect to be recruited by the British intelligence to provide a connection with the Eastern source. The action follows the more or less romanticized history (let's be fair - more) from recruiting Greville to the not so fortunate ending, but where Mr. Wynne's nationality provides hime a chance to survive.

What saves the movie is probably the fact that's based on true events. What drags it down is that the true events are a bit too "filmic". "The Courier" feels based on actual facts as much as "Titanic" feels to be a hystorical movie. The aproach is just too.. light - very theatrical and filled with stereotypes, clearly less realistic than "Jack Strong", but still acceptable if you're looking for something lighter. Anyway, coincidence or not - the two movies not being related production wise - at some point in the first part of "The Courier", we have a "deja vu" scene where colonel Penkovsky attends the execution of major Popov, yet another real spy discovered by the KGB. So we have a subject for the prequel's prequel.. :)

Rating: 3 out of 5

Mission Impossible: Fallout (2018)

I wrote before that I prefer the "MI" series to "Bond", one of the main reasons being that it doesn't take itself so serious as it happens in the 007 universe = typically you have a decent story, an ok action, and a comic relief factor that's there when's needed. It doesn't try to pass as a pretentious drama. It just comfortably sits in the action movies list and it does it really well. Or well... since the subject now is "MI6: Fallout" (no pun intended), it used to do it well...

Unfortunately the last part of the serious does exactly what I was criticizing above. It tries to be more "Bond" than before. First of all, it looks to me as the MI which si by far the most centered on the main character = Ethan Hunt, considering that other defining part of the series was "the team" and not just Tom Cruise as a super-spy. Don't get me wrong, we still have "the team", but much more of team leader on the screen. Besides that we have a story that being slightly complicated wants to pose as intelligent but it doesn't work. Because all the twists (not so many) are at least predictable, if not really under your own eyes. It's very annoying that the first consistent part of the movie where it's clear that a character in the good guys team is actually playing for the other side but nobody sees it, and even more he's obviously the guy searched by everybody but who nobody knows who really is. Maybe I should've written spoilers before saying that, but honestly... I really don't know who's not gonna get it...

Something good - the action scenes are indeed impressive, and it's pretty hard to achieve that anymore. It reminded be a bit of "Cliffhanger" (helicopters in the mountains). Simon Pegg is still in the team - so the comic relief is still there and works very well. The story itself is not so bad, but also not at the level where the previous two got. Tom Cruise runs marathons with a speed that would make Usain Bolt think if it wouldn't have worked doing that instead sprints... well, I'm not sure if this is something good. Anyway, enjoyable, but unfortunately way too predictable, which gets it way far from the critics' praise of "best action movie of the year". We still have some left of 2018, so I can hope to something with a more clever story...

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Our Kind of Traitor (2016)

The only reason why I'm writing this entry is to say that I got something done today... And if it's coming out decently luck might change (hopefully). It depends now how we define "today", but let's get back to "Our Kind of Traitor" until the dawn catches up.

We're speaking about an adaptation from an author who was pretty successful in the last decades - John Le Carre, although the genre we're talking about is an old school spy thriller that's not really common since the '80s passed. A literature professor traveling to Morocco in a romantic holiday with his wife, hoping to warm up a cold relation, is approached by a sort of accountant of the Russian mafia. Who decided to switch sides and come clean after the premature death of a "colleague". And like that, from a literature teacher, our guy finds himself in the position of an MI6 informer, getting involved in a pretty unlikely story, where he's decided to help his new friend.

The movie is helped a lot by the presence of four actors: Stellan Skarsgard, Damian Lewis, Naomie Harris and Ewan McGregor. In that order, not the one on the poster, although all of them play an excellent part. Otherwise, there's not much to see here. A relatively simple story, which as I was saying is not that credible either. All in all, there's a sort of romantic side in all this that I didn't really feel in this genre since "The Spy Who Came in from the Cold" (same author, 53 years ago). Considering that after all this time it's still working...

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Atomic Blonde (2017)

Short entry: "Atomic Blonde" is an atomic mess... What looks to be an action movie in the trailer, and if you check the production team looks like the female version of John Wick, starts like an adaptation of a John le Carre novel. And when I say John le Carre I'm referring to "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy" material with all the intricate heavy-entangled intrigue. The atomic blonde is a undercover MI6 agent sent to retrieve a list of spies from the Berlin of late '89 just when the wall is about to fall. Russians want the list too. And starting here we have a story told in an interrogation room in flashbacks, which in its first part has so many lengths that you lose track on who's planning what exactly. Ironically or not, we even have at some point an exchange of lines where our agent is blamed of losing time in Berlin with no results (or something like that). Anyway, probably the best part is the twist coming after the ending "twist"... the first being predictable from miles away. Although after you get the real twist, you have to explain yourself why the other one needed so much preparation... Better don't lose time with that. Just enjoy the '80s music - the second best part in the movie. Nena - 99 Luftballons still sounds good...

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

The Debt (2010)

"The Debt" is a good thriller ... if you're patient enough to wait for the halfway twist. Until then we have a story partly told in flashback of three Mossad agents tasked somewhere in the 60's with capturing the "surgeon of Birkenau" a Nazi war criminal hiding somewhere in the East Berlin. It's partly in flashback because the story actually starts 30 years after the events at the launch of a book covering the mission success. Inexplicably, one of the three commits suicide just before the book release festivity. Well, inexplicably until halfway in the movie :) ...

I would say something about the actors. More precisely about the casting. I can appreciate hiring a pair of actors for each of the three agents, as what I think it is a better alternative to an aging makeup that often fails, but the way the pairs were chosen is at least strange if not really confusing. You're initially tempted to associate the younger version of an agent to the other one and vice versa. Getting over this, I can't say the movie is exceptional in any aspect. The story, however, is quite well put together, it has that nostalgic/romantic part characteristic to the classic spy thriller genre that's nowadays sort of lost (we didn't have that in Bourne for instance), and the directing (John Madden) stands solid in the British tradition of this kind of movie. I would say that the result, especially considering the slow development, gets close to John le Carre ("Tailor of Panama", "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy", "A Most Wanted Man") .. maybe even better sometimes.

Rating: 3 out of 5

Jason Bourne (2016)

"Jason Bourne" returns as the fifth episode in the series, after "Bourne Legacy" where we had the impression that Bourne is done (that's why it was called "Legacy"). Well, he's back. And as long as you forgot the first three movies this one works. Because otherwise I assume you would need to fill up many continuity holes. So, as a stand alone movie (well, including the references to the past) is a decent spy thriller. In brief, the "self-exiled" Bourne finds out that his own family history and its CIA connections include a bit more than what he knew. So, we end up with a personal vendetta mixed with an inner political intrigue + a consistent reference to lack of privacy in online social media. Of course we're getting a share of exaggerations and shallow scenes, but overall it's fine. Even on the technical side :) (I was complaining about the kinetic camera badly used last time .. well, here we have the counterexample).

Rating: 3 out of 5

The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015)

When I've heard about a remake for "The Man from U.N.C.L.E." I've been very skeptical. I considered it just a trend movie in the endless row of genre flicks released this year: "Kingsman", "Spy", "Mission Impossible" and even the next Bond. Something along the lines "spy movies summer; it will sell". Besides that, loooooong long ago I've watched a couple episodes of the original series starring Robert Vaughn and David McCallum, and finding out that the leads for the Solo/Kuryakin couple are Superman and The Lone Ranger (= Henry Cavill + Armie Hammer) I said niet, it's a no go ... Oh, was I wrong or what? ...

The story ... well, a spy story in the '60s - something "classic" - a neo-nazi secret organization with a nuclear bomb and world domination on the agenda. Details are not important. They'll be when you'll watch the movie, not now. The way this thing is presented is important, or how to serve a bottle of aged Bond, aged in an oak barrel and just taken out of the wine cellar. Like I said, it's been ages since I've seen some of the original series. I vaguely remember the comic nuance that was present there. The new American-Russian spy couple keeps that but it still seems quite different. The character differences between the two are much more emphasized, e.g., the American charm vs. the Russian rigor. And it works. It works very well, and the two leads do their job perfectly.

The movie itself: what we have here is a jewel. It's without question the best I've seen this year as a cinematographic composition meaning the mix between the camera work, soundtrack and editing (yes, better than Mad Max). I can say that I'm impressed to notice that there are still cases of mainstream cinema, of 100% entertainment when you can catch a frame shot in style. Yeah, I know .. It's a clear reference to the '60s cinematography meant to impress through that, reversed perspectives, zoom out, editing with visual splits on the same frame with parallel action, etc. Doesn't matter ... The point is that the result looks very good. The sound - think on Tarantino movies. Enough said.

So, the answer for the start question is yes ... I was wrong. I forgot that the movie is directed by Guy Ritchie. Or, to be specific, I didn't notice that from all the movies he did there wasn't any that on my scale wasn't at least medium above average (even "Swept Away" got on the floating level - no pun intended - was ok for me). Probably the biggest plus in this whole production is given by the directing + script, and it's simply that at no time this wants to be another Bond, but just a fun movie, no constraints attached :) ...

Rating: 5 out of 5

Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation (2015)

I would've liked writing a solid "MI vs. Bond" entry, but there's still time until "Spectre", "Skyfall" is long gone, and besides that I don't time to write. In brief "Rogue Nation" convinced me of something that I wasn't sure yet after "Ghost Protocol". Somehow, for me, the U.S. secret agent version beats the British MI6. I can't say exactly why. I guess it's mostly because "Mission Impossible" doesn't take itself as seriously as the "Bond" movies. And since we got to that ...

Probably the best part in "Rogue Nation" is neither the story (which is a bit unpolished anyway), neither the action scenes, nor the "MI" version of a Bond girl (more plausible than actual Bond girls), but the comic relief. Simon Pegg reprises his IT mastermind part, getting here a presence that's almost on par with the main role both as importance in the script, and also as screen time. And that's exactly the element that helps cutting off the rigorous feel you have in a solid spy thriller (a la John le Carre), and as result to admit that we're watching an implausible story that doesn't assume it's more than typical action movie entertainment. Stuff that Bond keeps forgetting ... or otherwise said wants to look more complex than it is. If the MI's stunts would've also been more normal and less SciFi ...

The subject? Better than what's in the trailer. It doesn't make sense to spoil it. Enough. As said, no time to write ;)

Rating: 3+ out of 5

A Most Wanted Man (2014)

I've watched "A Most Wanted Man" between the winter holidays. I wanted to write this blog entry last weekend but, of course, I didn't have the time. After the unfortunate events happened this week, I seriously considered to change the topic. But I don't have anything better, and I already took a long break since my last entry. So ...

The movie is an adaptation of a novel by John Le Carre. For who's not acquainted with John Le Carre's work, chronologically: "The Spy Who Came in From the Cold", "The Russia House", "The Tailor from Panama", "The Constant Gardener", "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy" (and maybe others). To summarize, we're talking about a British author of spy thrillers, but on a subgenre that's totally opposed to Ian Fleming and anything related to James Bond. To be more precise, we have stories that relate to the activity of various intelligence services, stories that are placed in a real historical context, and which "feature" less action and more social drama. In "A Most Wanted Man" the setting is Hamburg, where a division of the German intelligence is involved in an operation targeting a possible thread on financial support for terrorist activities. In the middle of their investigation they suddenly get an unexpected help, in the form of ... a Chechen illegal immigrant, suspect of terrorist activities, freshly "unloaded" in the Hamburg docks, and who could finally lead to "the big fish" (to approximately quote the movie). Well, with the minor condition to be left free. Which of course seems to be a problem for the internal security. And I already told the whole story :) Sort of ...

Again, for who's not acquainted with John Le Carre, given also the "mega-spoiler" above, there is high chance to get bored by the movie. As it happened to me long, long ago for instance with "Russia House" (leaving aside that that movie wasn't very good anyway). However, if you know what to expect = a relatively short-spanned action development (with maybe some flashbacks), during which you have a ton of character build-up including a fine touch of psychological analysis, and you might get anytime a life irony hit like the right man at the wrong place (or the opposite), then ... Well, you got the right movie :)

Anton Corbijn, the director, manages to get in "A Most Wanted Man" something that he wasn't able in "The American". I'm not very inspired now to describe the result. But, if you've seen both movies, probably you'll know what I want to say. It's true that the typical John Le Carre based script helps more than the story in the other movie. It's more solid and it has a proper ending, so it shouldn't cause long yawns and a "what was that ?!" after the final credits. But it's also the case for the directing to help the script here. I think it's the best adaptation I've seen for Le Carre. It keeps a good balance between the romantic illusion present in spy novel, and the real life coldness that constantly hits back. To compare with, "The Constant Gardener" had mostly the first, and "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy" too much of the second. A solid help in all this comes from the exceptional cast, starting with the late Philip Seymour Hoffman unfortunately in one of his last roles, who shows again how wide was the range he had as an actor.

I'll close with a personal remark, getting back to the intro. It's an awkward feeling to write a review for a movie that revolves around the activity of a terrorist cell, in such an unfortunate moment when almost all the media channels are full of debates on similar topics. And the awkwardness doesn't necessarily come from the associated topic, but from the fact that a movie, or well - the book behind it - a fictional piece of work after all, seems to be more decent and even more credible as approach regarding the complexity and the implications of this type of situations compared to plenty talk-shows or briefings I heard on various news channels.

Rating: 4 out of 5

Safe House (2012)

"Safe House" is a sort of rehashed Bourne. That actually comes as a first recommendation: if you didn't like the last Bourne, probably watching "Safe House" is not the best choice, if you did like it you might give it a try but don't expect anything to top it.

The movie starts well, which attenuates a bit from the stupidity of the "Safe House - No One is Safe" tagline. However, considering you've seen this on the poster, it might be still better not to expect too much. The premise of the story though is rather original. Somewhere in South Africa, in a CIA safe house, we have an inexperienced agent (Ryan Reynolds) as the "host", or better said location administrator. Being bored to death and hoping for a promotion, in the spirit of the saying "be careful what you wish for", the guy gets one day the visit of an operative crew escorting a "guest". Which guest (Denzel Washington) is a former agent, went rogue for the last 10 years, and who apparently surrendered to the U.S. Consulate. I won't spoil all the beginning. To put it shortly, he seems to be followed by a whole bunch of very aggressive people who want something from him. In the end the movie is sort of like a continuous run .. a la Bourne .. but this comparison can stop somewhere at two thirds, if not before ...

The movie maintains a rhythm and an event flow built to be sufficiently "catchy" in the first part, but in the end ... 1. Light spoiler that grows up as you watch the movie: for a rather long period you don't really get to know who is the actual "bad guy", aspect that's supported by the standard technique of "subtle" suggestions .. so "subtle" that becomes clear what "surprise" will you get at the end. 2. The movie has a sort of impulse for cliche, but it manages to keep it contained for a while .. but not until the end, therefore making the final besides extremely predictable also quite boring. 3. The violence seemed to me a bit too exaggerated, although I normally don't have any issue with such things, and it's again especially towards the end of the movie .. to be honest I wonder if the director didn't take a holiday for a while making only sort of 1/2 of its job. To give also some good feedback I have to admit that the actors are up to their name indeed. Another thing to mention are some nice exterior shots giving you the feeling that South Africa is indeed the location where the action takes place. More than this .. it's ok as an average thriller to see before getting to bed when you don't have other better options .. it's a pity considering the beginning which was promising ...

Rating: 3 out of 5

The Bourne Legacy (2012)

Despite the fact that this was the last week of a sort of "vacation" I didn't get to see more than the "The Bourne Legacy". And since I'm busy packing my luggages, I don't have the time to get into much detail. So, let's get to the point ...

In the sequel to Bourne, which does not have anything to do with the original series of books, we have a sort of "reboot". More exactly we find that the American government has another secret program to train agents (actually .. more programs to have place also for another reboot ..). And like this we start again with Jeremy Renner instead Matt Damon, pissed off badly when the agency leadership decides to shut down the bussiness and "fire" the employees. Without other spoilers, the result is a Bond-Terminator mix :) The last part might sound a bit weird, and when you see the movie also a bit SciFi, but I really think it's the part to appreciate. And this because it makes somehow the movie to be a bit different from the previous ones.

Overall I liked it. I wasn't very sure since Tony Gilroy (the rest of Bourne, "Michael Clayton", "Devil's Advocate" .. but also "State of Play", "Proof of Life") which is also the director here and besides the usual screenwriter job, alternates sometimes from good to bad quite easily (although in my opinion he is currently one of the best thriller screenwriters). With all the similarity with the previous movies (after all it's the same series), the result is a pretty good one in its genre. And I have to admit that I'm also a bit subjective and I prefer the Bourne universe to Bond. We'll see about Skyfall ;)

Rating: 4 out of 5

Enigma (2001)

Considering its lately peak of success I said myself to stay on british movie territory this week with a title that's a bit older. "Enigma" is something close to a spy story during World War 2, but to be more exact as a general feeling it's like a mix between drama, thriller and romance in a rhythm that resembles a bit "The English Patient" = it might seem to have some overlengths when you watch it, but the final compensates this.

The subject is placed at Bletchley Park, the british centre in charge with the german transmission decrypting during WW2, having as point of start the broken affair between a cryptanalist and an operator working in different sectors. Well, this becomes the intrigue for a complicated story with mysterious person dissapearings and leaks of information to the enemy. The movie is a bit overdramatized at some points, especially considering that all the action, that takes place exclusively around the mentioned base, is relatively calm. There is some documentary value also in the movie = you get to see a real Enigma encrypting machine, and at some points there are actual explanations about how all this stuff worked, but I doubt that these are clear enough for a normal viewer who doesn't know much about the topic. One of the worst parts of the movie is the cinematography, the idea of using filters with a pale tone for the flashbacks being horrible, considering the movie already has pretty warm chromatic and pretty much lacks the contrast, and to put the cherry on top it is slow paced ... so the visual feeling = go to sleep. As good parts, as usual in an UK made movie you have the casting, but the best I think it's the score, this being the last John Barry movie. From my point of view, John Barry was probably among the top three british composers in the last century, and one of the few that made a difference during the '60s and the '70s from the classic discreet to almost anemic typical Hollywood composing style in that period.

One last thing to say is that the movie is based on a novel by Robert Harris, probably more known after the recent Polanski's "Ghost Writer" also based on one of his novels. The idea is that if you liked the above title or "Archangel" another historical/politic/spy thriller with the same book author (although quite weak as a movie) you'll probably enjoy "Enigma" too. It's the same type of mix between events and even characters inspired from reality but placed in a fictive context that tends to seem like an alternative history for what really happened. Maybe in "Enigma"'s case is not that obvious, considering the less popular/known context :) but I don't have time for details on this now.. just enjoy the movie, to quote it "a rose is just plaintext" ;)

Rating: 3 out of 5

The Quiller Memorandum (1966)

I wrote some time ago about "The Ipcress File" (sorry, only in the ro-version of the blog). I didn't see the sequels (there are at least two which theoretically may prove worthy of spending some time on them). However I've watched another movie last week placed in the same period (as subject and production time), also British, and overall the same kind of spy thriller, but with a completely different atmosphere, so to speak.

"The Quiller Memorandum" is placed somewhere in the '60s in the West Berlin. The intrigue is based on the assassination of two British agents involved in the discovery of a neo-Nazi movement HQ. This leads to giving the job to a third agent - the one with the name in the title - the difference being that this time is an American. The subject is relatively simple, and partly because of this, unlike in "The Ipcress File", here you can really feel the age of the movie. Other reasons for this impression are probably the directing style, the cinematography and actually pretty much of the movie making - even up to acting. However it still keeps a certain charm due to this "old" feeling that after all is just natural and common also to some of the early Bond movies. Speaking of Bond movies and others from the genre, you usually have a pretty typical secret agent construction as the main character. That would be probably the main difference in "The Quiller Memorandum". I do not know if they really wanted to come up like that, and I didn't see many movies with George Segal in the lead role, but the result here is completely different from anything I experienced on this genre. More specifically you can think of a parody of the classic type of character, however placed in a context as serious as it can be (for this type of movie at least). Starting from mimicry, replicas, to the fact that this "Bond" is not equipped with any gadgets and even he doesn't carry a gun, quoting approximately - "would just increase the chances to be killed". However as I said, the context of the action is not one of a comedy, although it might have some slight humor caused by the contrast between the German-Anglo rigidity and the American temperament. Overall sometimes it may seem a bit stupid on that part. For me, however, it was interesting.

Aside from a minor revelation to the end of the movie (which is actually left as an easy guess), the script relies more on witty dialogue than on complicating and twisting the plot. In the end the result is still quite “watchable”. The location setting is nice, I think the movie was filmed in West Berlin at least partially, so you have a bit of authentic 60's atmosphere from the area. There isn't much to tell on the movie making part besides that. The best part (except of the acting which depends on taste ... if it seems too "overacted" or not) would be the soundtrack. Just like in "The Ipcress File" (which was actually even better) you can appreciate the work of John Barry as composer. I think he is probably one of the best people in the industry from UK, at least for my taste of music - and again, at least for the productions made in the '60s and '70s when for example in the majority of films made in the U.S. you actually don't feel you have a soundtrack. In this case, it's just the opposite = it's clearly there. Well, that's all for today. I'll be back next week with a winter/spring preview of what is scheduled to premiere in the next moths. In the meantime ...

Rating: 3 out of 5