Company Business

Almost retired CIA spy Boyd (Gene Hackman) is called back to service to bring prisoner Grushenko (Mikhail Baryshnikov) to Russia as part of a prisoner exchange. from the beginning, Grushenko is suspicious, so maybe that's foreshadowing. and of course, a designated meeting goes bad, and "someone" is shooting at them. when Boyd calls DC for instructions, his boss turns out to be Kurt Smith, "Red" from the Seventies Show. Acc to wikipedia and other sources, there were soooo many issues making this film... an unfinished script, the fact the USSR was already kaput, and cast and production disagreements. it's also odd that both IMDB and wikipedier label this an action comedy.... i'll go along with the action, but never did hear the comedy. it's pretty well done as a serious action/drama, which is how the actors play it. the ending is pretty weak. there are a couple twists and turns, but it kind of ends with a whimper. no big showdown. which is ok. very european. written and directed by Nicholas Meyer. it's good. but it's not a comedy.

the great acting was about the best part of this for me. I also liked the storyline; it was deep enough but not so that you get too confused about why the things that are happening are happening. It was good to see lots of different and interesting locations: Berlin and Paris (I always wondered how the elevators went up the curved legs) in particular. The script was no slacker either. On top of the normal discussion you had witty one liners to lighten the mood. I thought it was charming how they started out (Hackman and Baryshnikov that is) as 'business men' doing their respective jobs, playing their roles but then became attached to one another and thus fought together. I also liked the mysteriousness of the ending. The 'where are the going to go now?' factor is usually a good touch. If anything was wrong with it I would've liked a little more action. The only real action scene I recall was the shootout in the subway. Other than that they were just running from baddies and jumping out of windows, which was entertaining but more confrontation would have been appreciated.

Apparently this film bombed at the box office and the director was very disappointed with how the whole thing turned out.

However, the film has a certain post cold war charm and the two leads Gene Hackman and Mihail Baryshnikov play nicely opposite each other.

True it's not a well finished film and scripting is, at times, nonsensical.

Gene Hackman is Sam Boyd, an old CIA agent who is dragged back into "Company Business" in this 1991 film also starring Mikhail Baryshnikov.

Boyd has to funnel money to the Russians using a prisoner switch as an excuse, but it all goes awry when, during the exchange, he realizes the prisoner the Russians are sending over is someone he just saw at the airport. He aborts the switch immediately.

He and his Russian (Baryshnikov) are directed to a safe house, but when it blows up, Hackman realizes the CIA wants both of them dead. So they go on the run with $2 million.

This film had a light, breezy atmosphere to it, and the two stars play it sort of like an "I Spy" episode. It's not an out and out comedy but it's pleasant and implausible enough.

Someone thought that the "big reveal" about the young woman helping the two in France made the thing truly ridiculous - I don't know why. Baryshnikov at the time of the filming was 43, and the young woman (Geraldine Danon) was 23. What's the problem?

Great locations in Berlin and France, good acting, and some exciting scenes. Fun if you're not expecting "The Spy Who Came in from the Cold."

Rewatching this in 2020 (last viewing was probably mid-90s!) I must say I enjoyed this mild mannered "spy games" light comic thriller. Showing its age now with references to Princess Diana and protagonists smoking on an aeroplane. Has shades of better movies like MIDNIGHT RUN and 48 HOURS but with its own unique charm. I like the twisty turny espionage plot (like an early dry run of Jason Bourne films) and the Michael Kamen score sounds very DIE HARD esque, which adds to some of the more tense scenes (especially the spy trade gone wrong scene about halfway through the film). Lots of good strong supporting actors chewing scenery, and I'll watch Hackman in anything! Some of the dialogue makes me laugh too ("He's so rich he could ski uphill"), and I thought the cinematography was good on my modern 60 inch television. It also serves as a great travelogue of Berlin and Paris. Loses a few points for a totally abrupt ending, almost like they ran out of budget! I would have loved another 10-15 minutes to see how the characters ended up, and if they made it to the Seychelles.