Breach - L'infiltrato

I was surprised at how effective this was. You know from the very beginning how it will end. You know because it is a true story that there will be no trendy plot twists. You expect, and find, that the young assistant is built around a cliché, as is Hanssen's Catholicism, which oddly ignores the role of Opus Dei in this venture, and focuses on prayer instead of devotion.

And there is a formulaic bit about damaging fathers and odd wives. More: there's the project command center that is drawn from movies and not from life. And finally, our hero is told the FBI's biggest secret in an open public place. This would never ever happen, and it is staged this way only to help the pacing of the thing in terms of stagecraft. And that DIA computer room, with the nice clean Cray-like machines, is from the same fantasy world as "Red October's" neon-lighted missile tubes.

But in spite of all this, it works. And especially compared to "The Departed," it works, simply, cleanly, deeply.

That's because the filmmaker decided early in the game that he was going to do what the Hong Kong "Infernal Affairs" did well and others copied: this business of actors playing characters who are actors. In this case, we have two such in the same boat.

We have a top information manager at the FBI working for the Russians and acting normal, even when leading the hunt for himself. We have the young under cover guy pretending to be simply a clerk. Each intuits the other is watching. The older man completely wins at the start, with the younger man eventually besting him in artifice. Its a calculation that the filmmaker makes, when deciding not to tell us why our young hero does what he does and where he gets the tools. In an ordinary story, that would hurt, but here it is a wise decision because such "explaining" would get in the way of the economy of the thing. And it is all about economic connection with us.

Its a bit counterintuitive that effective stories sometimes get better by lopping off story elements and information. But it is true. Some students of the Hanssen case believe that Hanssen's primary motive was to show his own importance (as a information security planner) by revealing holes in the system that he would have plugged. I wish this film would have worked with that a bit, because this notion of helping the system by hurting is system is both what the story could have been about and the means used to tell the story.

Still, a good one.

As a historical note, there's a reason folks from the FBI and CIA, even senior ones, can't wander into NSA computing facilities. Hanssen wasn't allowed, probably a good thing at the time. Opus Dei again.

Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

The FBI has finally identified a top level traitor who during the Cold War and afterwards sold costly secrets to the Communist bloc. It's not someone in a million years you would suspect. Robert Hanssen, a person of no apparent vices, a very religious Catholic, a member of Opus Dei, loving husband, father, and grandfather, as All American as you can get.

His espionage cost America dear, the trick now is to get him caught in the act so he can go away for a very long time, maybe even be subject to capital punishment. He's a clever guy Hansseen, as chief investigator Laura Linney says, he'd spot a phony cover story in a nano-second. Send someone in at first, but don't tell them the whole reason for the investigation.

Playing Robert Hanssen is Chris Cooper and the mole sent to catch a mole, Ryan Phillippe. Most of the film is a battle of wits between the two of them. The film takes on a whole different perspective however when Phillippe is told the real reason for the intense investigation of Cooper.

What's nice about Breach and what probably won't draw in the action fans is there is a minimum of violence in the film. Instead it's a character study of two men, fighting what seems to be an uneven battle of wits. Phillippe quite frankly seems overmatched at times, but he does think on his feet. Cooper is nobody's fool, mainly because he's fooled everybody for decades.

Favorite scene in the film is Cooper trying to articulate the reason for the treason to agent in charge, Dennis Haysbert. What it essentially comes down to is he's a brilliant man who's angry because he never got the respect he feels he deserved. He was going to show everyone just how smart he was.

Strange are the things that can make a traitor, spy, or terrorist. Though it does get slow at times, I think people will enjoy Breach and see a great acting duel with Cooper and Phillippe.

Greetings again from the darkness. Writer/Director Billy Ray was the creative force behind "Shattered Glass" a few years ago and obviously is drawn to true stories of human deception. Here he takes on one of our biggest fears ... a federal agent who sells out his own country. Normally we only get these type of scenarios in LeCarre novels, but the story of FBI agent Robert Hanssen is a real life nightmare.

Perfect casting has Chris Cooper as the very odd Hanssen who has nearly 25 years with the bureau, many of which have been spent selling off national secrets to the Soviet Union. In an almost unbelievable stroke of luck, Hanssen was put in charge of finding the mole ... yes, his job was to find himself!! Cooper is very strong here as the ego-maniacal tortured soul who pulls off his deceit with a disarming devotion to religion, the bureau and blending. He appears to be just another working stiff pulling in a paycheck.

Most of the supporting staff is solid. Laura Linney is slightly miscast as the agent in charge of bringing Hanssen down. Dennis Haysbert is her boss. Gary Cole plays it straight here, and Kathleen Quinlan (as Hanssen's wife) and Bruce Davison (as Eric O'Neill's dad) have brief but effective turns. Caroline Dhavernas is an actress I am not familiar with, but her performance here has me intrigued.

The weak link in the film is Ryan Phillipe, who just doesn't possess the acting chops to pull off the pivotal role of Eric O'Neill - the agent wannabe who gets thrust into the crucial position of bringing Hanssen down. It is just implausible to believe Phillipe could ever pass the FBI entrance exam, much less outsmart the guy who outsmarted the entire bureau for two decades. Despite the weakness, the story is strong enough to overcome this and maintain the quasi-thriller feel. This is quite an accomplishment for a film when all the viewers know how it will end!! The real life Hanssen is spending life in prison and O'Neill immediately resigned from the bureau for the "normal" life of a Washington attorney. Part spy thriller, part history lesson, part psychoanalysis, "Breach" is very enjoyable despite the fact that we are provided no real answers as to WHY this man acted as he did. We are only led to believe that it wasn't the money, but instead the ego that drove his madness.

The performances were all just fine, the story had the potential to be intriguing, the characterizations ought to have been riveting.

Why then, was this movie so ho-hum? It felt like the director and writers didn't know what story they were trying to tell. Was it a character study of a traitor? No, we don't get much depth on Hanssen. Was it a taut thriller? No, there weren't thrills to speak of, and no real twists or turns. Was it an inside-the-FBI potboiler? No, we didn't learn much about the bureaucracy of intelligence.

At times, there were glimmers of each of these stories, but never any depth on any them. I felt like we skated along the surface of a story that would have been much more interesting viewed from underneath the ice.

I don't recommend spending the time on this, unless you really like looking at Ryan Phillipe. I do, and it still didn't elevate it.

"Breach" is slow - slow enough to recommend waiting to rent for most people. It is a good story, but the material requires the methodical pacing that will bore viewers hoping for car chases and gun fights.

The most authentic part of the movie is its attention to detail. The interior shots look like the drab, boring government offices they portray. This wonderfully realistic touch will be lost on those that haven't toiled in such holes; it is nice that a movie finally depicts a governmental office that looks like one, instead of a futuristic, gleaming movie version that has more in common with the starship Enterprise.

Intentionally or not, the drabness goes beyond the office spaces (apologies to - yeahhh - Gary Cole). Laura Linney's hair is flat and dull, and she's as pale as a ghost. All of the exterior shots are cloudy with a 70% chance of showers, like DC all winter long. The somber look of the movie enhances theme, but will probably leave some viewers with a bad taste.

As a retired intelligence analyst, I enjoyed this movie because it reminds us that traitors exist, and they cause damage to our national security. Like "United 93" it isn't easy or enjoyable to watch, but the subject matter is thought provoking.