The Constant Gardener (2005)

8.5 Popcorn boxes

The excellent British film actor Ralph Fiennes plays the troubled Justin Quayle, who is married to the mercurial Tess (Rachel Weisz).  Tess is a strong, forthright doctor who is obsessed about social issues, from war to corporate greed.  At the beginning of the film, Tess is missing, and it's up to Justin, who loves his unconventional wife very much, to unravel the mysteries surrounding her death.

The film is non-linear, with frequent flashbacks, which took some getting used to.  So even though Tess is very much dead, she plays a large part in the film.  She's not an altogether sympathetic character, willing to trade on her looks and 'feminine wiles' to achieve her goals.  She's suspicious of a drug trial being conducted in Kenya.  Participants on the whole do well in a trial of a tuberculosis drug, dypraxa, but some end up very dead, due to side effects.  The company literally buries its failures, and Tess goes out looking for them.

The film is based on the book of the same name by John LeCarre.  LeCarre made his name writing Cold War thrillers such as 'The Spy Who Came in from the Cold', and 'Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy' (both superb books made into more than excellent films and miniseries).  He had a fallow period with the end of the East-West spy trade, and it took him a while to find new venues to explore.

LeCarre is a left-of-center writer, who has said that the corporate misdeeds in this film were just a 'holiday postcard' compared to what goes on in the pharmaceutical business.  What he doesn't explain, though, is how a bad drug like dypraxa would not be eventually found out.  I don't particularly share his paranoia, but I see where he's coming from.

Director Fernando Meirelles, a Brazilian by birth, turns in an excellent picture, capturing screenwriter Jeffrey Caine's vision of the LeCarrie novel.   Caine's screenplay was nominated for an Academy Award, as it should have been. 

The photography and location shots must be commented upon.  Africa, as portrayed in the film, is a sprawling, complex land of violence, extreme poverty, and natural beauty.

Rated R for violence and sexual content

Zero Dark Thirty (2012)

9.0 Popcorn Boxes

Zero Dark Thirty is a sprawling film set in Washington DC, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, and chronicles a fictionalized account of the US hunt for Osama bin Laden, the leader of the al-Qaeda terrorist network.  The film revolves around Maya (Jessica Chastain), who is obsessed with capturing or killing bin Laden.  She’s aided by Dan (Jason Clarke) and Jessica (Jennifer Ehle), who portray fellow CIA agents.  Kyle Chandler (Joseph Bradley), has a meaty role as the Islamabad CIA station chief.   The cast is rounded out with a number of rough-and-tumble macho-types who play Navy Seal team members

The movie really could be entitled ‘Maya’s Obsession’.  By 2011, al-Qaeda was a diminished agent of terror, and bin-Laden’s hand could not be found on many terrorist acts.  So his capture/killing took on more of a symbolic act than one that could, for example, prevent another September 11.  Maya’s spent her whole career hunting bin-Laden, and cannot change her focus, though her help is needed on other terrorism matters, such as the attempted bombing of New York’s Time Square.  In the film, Maya is obnoxious, abrasive, insultive, annoying and off-putting.  You’re surprised she could keep her job.  She not only doesn’t mind stepping on toes, she relishes it.  However, through dogged work, enhanced interrogation and some lucky breaks , she and other CIA agents finally track down bin-Laden’s most trusted courier, and follow him to bin Laden’s fortified compound.  Finally getting permission to raid the home, Navy Seals come under the cover of darkness and breach the compound’s substantial walls, and find and kill the terrorist.

Zero Dark Thirty is a very effective film.  It’s exciting and fascinating as it explores the culture of Pakistan and the world of intelligence gathering.  We get to see how  interrogation techniques can generate real information without going into forbidden areas of torture and violence, and how hard work and sacrifice can pay off.  The difficulties in assessing sometimes contradicting information is on excellent display here. 

The film was nominated for numerous awards, including five academy awards, (though it only won for sound editing) and four Golden Globe awards, wining one for Best Actress for Jessica Chastain. 

Rated R for disturbing imagery and violence