The Insider

Full disclosure: when I first saw the trailer for Black Bag, I wasn't impressed. In fact, I was even less impressed when I assumed it was just another run-of-the-mill spy thriller about agents hell-bent on destabilising Moscow.

Boyyyyy, was I wrong.

This film is an absolute class act - an intelligent, gripping espionage drama that had me hooked from start to finish. Cate Blanchett and Michael Fassbender deliver powerhouse performances, balancing raw intensity with the kind of nuance that elevates the film beyond your standard spy fare. Their chemistry is electric, and every moment between them crackles with tension.

The supporting cast is just as strong, with Naomie Harris, Regé-Jean Page, and Pierce Brosnan adding layers of intrigue and depth. The dialogue is razor-sharp, and the script is packed with twists and turns that never feel forced - just expertly crafted storytelling at its finest.

Steven Soderbergh is in his element here, blending sleek cinematography with a tight, sophisticated narrative. It's stylish, smart, and effortlessly cool. If you think you know what to expect from Black Bag, think again. This is espionage cinema at its absolute best.

This taut spy thriller from Stephen Soderbergh doesn't exactly reinvent the wheel of the spy fiction genre, but it's definitely and thoroughly well-made and well-acted. Viewers should first and foremost know that this is a small-scale drama/thriller without action scenes and mostly set in a handful of relatively confined locations, so it is definitely not like a James Bond or Mission Impossible-style spy movie. For patient and sophisticated viewers who enjoy a lot of cleverness with their mystery and intrigue, "Black Bag" will prove to be an entertaining watch. The cast is generally pretty good, especially Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett, who are the two leads.

The film feels stylish and polished despite its small scale and brief running time. Soderbergh's deft direction keeps things running quickly and efficiently, paying special attention to the psychological and intuitive motives of the characters. The plot developments aren't particularly unique compared to other spy films, which is what holds back "Black Bag" from being truly great, but its commitment to creating intriguing narrative tension in an entertaining way and at a small scale is commendable. Recommended. 7/10.

This is not your average spy thriller: it's mainly talk, tons of it, between a small group of British intelligence employees who all seem to live their personal and work lives in each others pockets and beds. To attempt to add gravitas to the production, the colour has been desaturated and the light dialled down to dull and grim, so viewers know it's a serious drama, not James Bond.

There are a few effective action set pieces to keep viewers awake ( not my wife, unfortunately, she slept through most of it ) but not really enough, I'm guessing, to satisfy the action fans.

For film fans who try to see everything that opens in cinemas, only.

Yeah, itsss sort of a serious semi-realistic James Bond in high metropolitan life. While I like the artists involved, most of them play it quite well. The main negative entrance in the genre is Cat Blanchet though. She usually plays high drama roles and somewhat ironic twists, doing it very well.

Unfortunately, for me, her role as the dismantled Queen of England in medieval setting overshadows everything else. She absolutely showed sheer brilliance in that movie and a larger than life real woman of real decadence and love of life

Here, she really goes dark every time she tries hard, failing the part badly. Michael Fastbender does well and quietly carries a bit of swagger of investigative mind, but not tto great either. The movie is slow and sort of interesting at times, but so "pretensively modern life" that it leaves me with no choice but to walk out of it.

I find myself increasingly weary of the spy film genre, especially those that center around a romantic couple. It has become a trope so familiar, so predictable, that the very notion of it now feels like an exercise in the mundane. Each iteration feels almost mechanically constructed, as if there is an unspoken formula at play, one that prioritizes style over substance, a kind of cinematic sleight of hand designed to keep the audience distracted from the lack of originality beneath the surface. In this particular instance, however, the dialogue attempts to elevate itself above the usual banter of its kind, but only to the point of indulging in an almost ostentatious, borderline pretentious, air of intellectualism. There's a certain artifice to it all-an effort to sound clever, to sound profound, that ultimately rings hollow. The conversations between the characters, rather than offering any real emotional depth or compelling insight, instead feel like performative displays of wit, which do little more than alienate rather than engage. This was a film that seemed more concerned with showcasing its own perceived sophistication than with crafting any meaningful connection with its audience. And yet, despite all its verbal flourishes, it never once managed to grasp my attention in any truly significant way. The pacing felt sluggish, the stakes hardly compelling, and the emotional core-if one could even call it that-was so underdeveloped it barely registered. In the end, it was less a work of cinema and more an exercise in style over substance, one that never captured my imagination or curiosity.