Nate At The Movies

Man, I love Spring Break. Mickey 17 yesterday, Black Bag today, Opus tomorrow, and Snow White this weekend. I’m spoiled with free time, which allowed me to see a movie today that I didn’t have a lot of interest in at first, but once I started hearing good things about it, I wanted to check it out.

As my dad accurately predicted, the film was very British, but also very satisfyingly so. I was almost angered by that one American intelligence agent when his scene came up; how dare he speak so messily! The mystery was simultaneously interesting and hard to follow, even with a small number of players. I think disclosing what the traitor had allegedly done earlier in the movie would’ve helped me follow the mystery better, but I did eventually put it all together (yes, even before George’s final dinner scene). I was a bit bored in the first half as the foundation was laid, but as players became more suspicious and George acted more risky, I became more engaged.

Speaking of George, Michael Fassbender was really strong in the lead role. All of the principal actors were extremely cold, and I think, in this case, that’s a good thing. I believed each and every one of them as spies, and really unforgiving ones at that. Fassbender, Blanchett, and Marisa Abela (who I seemingly missed last year in Back in Black) were my favorites of the bunch, and I still feel like I’ve got a real unrepresentative read on Cate Blanchett’s career, because all I’ve seen of hers is this, TÁR, and freaking Borderlands. Cate, I’m sorry.

The score was sparse but suspenseful (good use of kettle drum and tritones) and the edit was sometimes good, but there was some pretty terrible backlight in the office and the first dinner scene had a few nauseating cuts. Despite that, I still liked Black Bag. I’m not well-versed in spy films, but this felt like a strong, albeit slow-paced foray into the genre. I have to think there aren’t very many spy couples stronger than George and Kathryn (possibly Mr. and Mrs. Smith, but I haven’t seen that yet, so who knows?).