“A Highly Involved Thriller That’s Hard to Interpret”

The Interpreter should have been great. With two powerhouse actors in Sean Penn and Nicole Kidman, an A-list director in Sydney Pollack and a solid yarn spun from storywriters Martin Stellman and Brian Ward, and screenplay writers Charles Randolph, Scott Frank and Steven Zaillian, The Interpreter should have been the thriller of the year. Instead, it’s simply a good movie that features fine performances and a plot that is fairly relevant in our terror-wracked world.

Silvia Broome (Kidman), a skilled U.N. interpreter, returns to work late one night to retrieve a bag and overhears a whispered conversation detailing plans to assassinate a despised foreign leader, Zuwanie, in two days hence. Enter Tobin Keller (Penn), a member of the secret service, who is commissioned to investigate Silvia’s claim and verify her veracity or verisimilitude. At first, Silvia and Tobin’s conversations play out like a series of chess moves, but they gradually develop a tenuous friendship after opening up about their painful pasts. Some of the movie’s standout events are: a bus bombing, a man in a mask standing outside Silvia’s window on the fire-escape, and, of course, the climactic assassination attempt on the foreign terrorist’s life.

The Interpreter is engaging, if not a bit plodding at times, and spins elaborate webs of political intrigue, dark motives and sordid pasts. However, there’s so much going on in the movie, that the multitude of players and situations actually becomes a deterrent to the movie’s accessibility and enjoyment. What’s more, the end is patently predictable and there’s no real emotional payoff in the film.

Penn is solid, but he certainly isn’t stellar, and we’ve seen Kidman in meatier roles (The Hours), as well. The scene where Tobin tells Silvia that his wife died only twenty-three days earlier is the emotional core of the movie, but the meaningful interplay, like a New York minute, is over far too quickly and we’re back to muddy narrative and impotent action sequences. It’s a shame these two award-winning actors weren’t given the kind of material that would properly showcase their exceptional talents.

One gratifying aspect of the movie, however, is the extensive filming inside the U.N. building—this is the first movie to be accorded such a privilege (Hitchcock’s 1959 opus, North By Northwest, received no such dispensation, but the genius auteur grabbed a shot of Carey Grant climbing the steps of the U.N. building from across the street).

In the end, The Interpreter translates into an underachieving thriller that will soon blend in with all the other mediocre suspense films at Blockbuster.

Rating: 2 1/2

Tags: Drama, Mystery, Thriller