Review: Bridge of Spies
With the mountains of awards and Saharas of praise heaped upon them over their decades-long careers, it would be difficult to classify either Steven Spielberg of Tom Hanks as underrated. Their individual and collective works, especially in the last three decades, have always been steeped in excellence; whatever their flaws, one cannot deny the quality of the effort. Their fourth and latest collaboration is a typically impeccable product, and yet it feels fresher and more energised than the combined total of their output in the last 15 years. Truly superlative on all fronts, Bridge of Spies finds both director and actor not just at their creative peaks, but also displaying an ease with their talents that makes the espionage drama a tense and riveting but also joyous watch.
The first fifteen minutes rank as some of the best work in Spielberg's career. It is 1957, the height of the Cold War, and a time when the Americans and Russians were dispatching spies to each other's homelands to mine for intelligence on the other's nuclear capabilities and intentions. One Soviet agent Rudolf Abel (an outstanding Mark Rylance) is going about his business in Brooklyn as a team of FBI agents follow his every more. The tension Spielberg creates as one nondescript man after another reveals themselves to be government agents amidst a sea of similarly dressed commuters is something to behold. They are amongst us and, if our own people can disguise themselves in ordinariness, then who's to say our enemies can't do the same? When the agents finally burst through Abel's door and start ransacking his apartment, one can't help but admire the man's sangfroid as he kindly asks for his dentures before destroying his intel right under their noses.
With the Rosenbergs' conviction as traitors to their country still fresh in the public consciousness and children being taught "Duck and Cover" drills in the classrooms, paranoia for a perceived thermonuclear attack plagues just about every man, woman, and child. The American government wants to make an example of Abel, but they also want to ensure that they are seen giving Abel a fair shake. "American justice will be on trial," after all. To that end, insurance lawyer James B. Donovan (Hanks) is tapped by his firm to represent the Soviet spy. The assignment is a lost cause and Donovan will be reviled in the country for defending a traitor, but Abel must have a reasonable defense nonetheless. "Everyone will hate me, but at least I'll lose," Donovan jokes.
No one, not his firm and certainly not his family, want Donovan to mount a genuine defense but Donovan is a man of principle, one who is committed to doing his duty and upholding both the letter and the spirit of the law. The rulebook, the Constitution, is exactly what makes them American, Donovan tells the CIA agent who presses him to supersede attorney-client privilege with patriotism. "Don't nod at me like that, you sonofabitch," is Donovan's parting line to the smarmy agent. There are only three actors who could ever deliver that line with righteous indignation without being sanctimonious: James Stewart, Gregory Peck, and Tom Hanks.
The courtroom maneuverings of the film's first third soon gives way to a cold war thriller. Donovan is tasked with another tricky and far more dangerous job: negotiate the release of captured American U-2 spy pilot Francis Gary Powers (Austin Stowell). Not only must Donovan broker an exchange with the Russians, he also endeavours to secure the safe return of Frederic Pryor (Will Rogers), an American student arrested as a spy in East Berlin. Though the CIA could care less about the fate of Pryor, and the Germans are tetchy at having any sort of Russian involvement, Donovan insists on the 2-for-1 trade. "Every person matters," he declares.
Inspired by true events, Bridge of Spies is an intelligently scripted, superbly acted, and immaculately directed piece of adult entertainment. Spielberg means to spotlight the everyman and the simple yet often complex ideal of doing the right thing. What's rather intriguing about the screenplay by Matt Charman, Ethan Coen, and Joel Coen is how doing the right thing - whether it be presuming a man innocent until he is found guilty or not spilling any information to the enemy - can often be a thankless, and sometimes vilified, act. There is also a subversiveness not only in rooting for Donovan to defend the so-called enemy, but also in the commonality shared by the warring sides. Note how Donovan frames his defense of Abel - Abel was merely doing the job he was given to do, and doing it well. Should Abel then be punished for the very dedication we expect from ourselves? There are weighty themes and thorny narrative strands in Bridge of Spies but, to borrow one of Donovan's lines, the story is told in a way that makes sense.
Spielberg does indulge in one of those Spielbergian over-touches, particularly in the triple ending that redundantly drapes Donovan in metaphorical red, white and blue. Save for those final minutes, Bridge of Spies is filmmaking at its highest level.
Bridge of Spies
Directed by: Steven Spielberg
Written by: Matt Charman, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen
Starring: Tom Hanks, Mark Rylance, Amy Ryan, Alan Alda, Austin Stowell, Scott Shepherd, Sebastian Koch, Eve Hewson, Billy Magnussen, Jesse Plemons, Mikhail Gorevoy, Will Rogers, Edward James Hyland, Dakin Matthews
