A Most Wanted Man (2014)

Stars Philip Seymour Hoffman, Robin Wright, Rachel McAdams, Daniel Bruhl, Willem Dafoe and Grigory Dobrygin

Directed by Anton Corbijn

Running time 122 minutes

Let me preface my remarks with an emphatic disclaimer- this is not a James Bond movie…

I really like this film. I will admit to a general prejudice in that I enjoy films based on John Le Carre novels…. and there have been some memorable characterizations over the years- Richard Burton as Leamas, Alec Guiness as George Smiley, Sean Connery as Barley Blair, Geoffrey Rush as Pendel and Ralph Fiennes as Justin Quayle.

What draws me back to John Le Carre’s novels repeatedly is that the themes of loyalty and betrayal at the core of his work have made some of his stories tales for the ages. Le Carre raises the spy novel to the height of a literary genre in the company of writers like John Buchan and Somerset Maugham. O.K. …I’ve got that off my chest.

This is Philip Seymour Hoffman’s last completed film- that alone should capture some attention. To the surface of the labyrinthine plot: Gunther Bachman (Hoffman) is a middle-aged Geman intelligence officer on the skids. He has been retired homeward from Beirut after losing his spy network due to the clumsiness or worse of the C.I.A. Bachman has been put out to pasture in Hamburg, the city that played host to the 9/11 conspirators. He operates as a rogue agent independently of the Bundespolizei and specializes in bringing down jihadists. His mission is to even the score by the artful penetration of spies and by using the enemy’s own weight to bring him down.

In some quarters there have been remarks about the lack of “shoot-em-up” action in the film… I repeat that this is not a James Bond movie.

The film-makers were worried about accents- Le Carre talks about this in his N.Y. Times tribute to Philip Seymour Hoffman. My gut feeling is that it’s not that important. The whole question of accent is so idiosyncratic…England is the source of the English language and it is WE who are speaking English with a Canadian or American accent… exercising a little suspension of disbelief would not be amiss here.

Director Corbijn’s previous outing in the action film “The American” served him well here and the film is taut and well -paced. Two thumbs enthusiastically up.

Links:

amostwantedmanmovie.com imdb.com/title/tt1972751/

rottentomatoes.com/m/a_most_wanted_man/

fandango.com/amostwantedman_170527/movieoverview/

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Most_Wanted_Man_(film)

metacritic.com/movie/a-most-wanted-man

and for an article by John le Carre on Philip Seymour Hoffman: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/20/movies/john-le-carre-on-philip-seymour-hoffman.html?module=Search&mabReward=relbias%3Ar