This is an interesting attempt at making a “real” spy movie, one where the spies behave like real spies, without car chases, without shoot-outs, without super-intense interrogation scenes.
For the most part it works, but there are enough problems with the finished product that I can’t quite recommend it. Like Argo, it takes liberties with the truth but unlike Argo, it is not quite suspenseful enough. I bring up Argo only because I think it serves as a good comparison of a more successful film of a similar type.
The biggest problem with this film, I think, is that it’s scope is too big – Reagan and Mitterand make appearances and they are totally unnecessary. (As is, I think, the rather odd attempt to connect this story with a “bluff” about the Star Wars program, given that the Star Wars program was a real thing and not just a bluff.) I think the whole background with Dafoe’s character and the presidents takes away from the main story of the film. I also feel like the film could have been cut a little better.
But it’s still an interesting attempt at making a spy thriller we can actually believe.
7/10
- Directed by Christian Carion
- Produced by Philip Boëffard, Bertrand Faivre, Christophe Rossignon
- Written by Christian Carion
- Starring
- Emir Kusturica – Sergei Grigoriev (based on Vladimir Vetrov)
- Guillaume Canet – Pierre Froment, an engineer working in the Moscow branch of French electronics conglomerate Thomson-CSF
- Alexandra Maria Lara – Jessica, his wife
- Willem Dafoe – Feeney, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency
- Fred Ward – U.S. President Ronald Reagan
- Philippe Magnan – President François Mitterrand of France
- Niels Arestrup – Vallier, Director of French Security DST
- David Soul – Hutton, aide to President Reagan
- Ingeborga Dapkunaite – Natasha, Grigoriev’s wife
- Dina Korzun – Alina, Grigoriev’s colleague and mistress
- Yevgeni Vasilyevich Kharlanov – Igor, the Grigorievs’ son
- Christian Sandström – Federal Bureau of Investigation agent
- Diane Kruger, Benno Fürmann, Gary Lewis and Alex Ferns make cameos
- Music by Clint Mansell
- Cinematography by Walther van den Ende
- Edited by Andrea Sedlácková
- Production company: Canal+
- Distributed by Pathé
- Release date: September 4, 2009
- Running time: 113 minutes
- Country: France
- Language: French, Russian, English
- Budget: $21 million
- Box office: $7.4 million