All the Old Knives
A good spy movie comes in two flavors- the James Bond/Jason Bourne/”Mission: Impossible” action-heavy variety, or the intricate, detailed, sharply plotted type. The latter is certainly harder to pull off, because it relies so much more on tying up the loose ends, and characters making decisions we believe and care about in order to get to the end game. I’m still very mixed on whether I think “All the Old Knives” accomplishes that, but the performances by Chris Pine and Thandiwe Newton succeed in making us care about it anyway.
The story begins in 2012. We are at a CIA base in Vienna, Austria, watching a hostage situation unfold on Turkish Airlines Flight 127. Terrorists have killed everyone on board, and agents like Henry Pelham (Pine) are helpless to have prevented it. He sees Celia Harrison (Newton)- a fellow agent and his lover- run out of the office, to the streets; they never see each other again. Well, that’s not true. Eight years later, Pelham’s boss (Laurence Fishburne) has assigned him to close the book on 127- something just doesn’t sit right, and the supposed leader of the terrorist cel has said there was a mole in the agency during interrogation. Suspicions fall numerous places, including Celia (now married with kids in Wine Country, California) and her boss, Bill Compton (Jonathan Pryce), who had some unusual calls on his office line. He meets Celia at a restaurant, and they start to talk about that day.
Olen Steinhauer has adapted his own book for the screenplay, and I think it’s a decent script, even if some of the revelations feel strained. The direction by Janus Metz doesn’t really add much (although he does keep it moving at a brisk pace), but it also doesn’t subtract anything either, although there are certainly shots and camera angles lifted from many a thriller before. Pine and Newton are the strengths of this film, as we see them remembering not just that moment in time, but also the passions their relationship had. What made Celia walk away from both her career, and Henry, back then? What does Henry’s history in Russia have to do with his current situation? Why were calls to Iran made from Compton’s phone at the office? Why did the plan to breach change, all of the sudden? The personal narratives revolving around Henry and Celia are more interesting than the hostage situation, and I think that’s part of why “All the Old Knives” doesn’t completely succeed; the discord between them is palpable and intense, and seeing how that plays out is the most riveting part of the film. What happened on Flight 127 is tragic, but what separated Henry and Celia feels more so, especially when we come to discover the truth. Unfortunately, it feels like its importance to the characters has more to do with what happened between them than what happened to the people on board. As a result, “All the Old Knives” is solid, but not what it probably should have been.
