MY DVD Collection - 09 Feb 2007

(Point Blank [de])

USA 1967
d: John Boorman
Warner Home Video (Region 0 us)

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One of the definitive films to emerge from Hollywood in the late '60s, this hard-nosed adaptation of Richard Stark's "The Hunter" owed much to the European influences that Boorman brought with him from England. People have noted the influence of Resnais behind the film's time lapses and possible dream setting, but Godard's "Alphaville" offers a more rewarding comparison. Both films use the gangster/thriller framework to explore the increasing depersonalisation of living in a mechanised urban world. Just as Constantine's Lemmy Caution was a figure from the past stranded in a futuristic setting, so Marvin's bullet-headed gangster is an anachronism from the '50s transported to San Francisco and LA of the '60s, a world of concrete slabs and menacing vertical lines. Double-crossed and left to die, Marvin comes back from the dead to claim his share of the money from the Organization, only to become increasingly puzzled and frustrated when he finds there is no money, because the Organization is the world of big business run by respectable men with wallets full of credit cards.
— CPe, Time Out Film Guide
•••••
Another circle, in which a somnambulist Lee Marvin, furious but somehow immaterial, strides and beats his way around a cell of supporting actors, demanding to be let in. John Boorman's first American picture is still his best film, influenced by Resnais and maybe by Borges, but wildly excited by American sleaze, cars, glass elevators, penthouses, bars, sex and violence, and by that poignant abandoned studio, Alcatraz. "Point Blank" can be read as a vengeance story: the wronged outlaw survives San Francisco Bay and gets his $93,000 back. Except that, at the end, he doesn't risk opening the passage. Is he still there? Was he ever there? Or is the entire film a loser's dream of success as he fades out of life in a cell on the derelict Alcatraz? Lee Marvin acts on the principle that we need know very little about a movie character to feel his force. Marvin creates need, image and power by denial and defiance of explanation. He is as flat, arbitrary and thunderous as the screen. But all around him, the movie crawls with worried plausibility--from Carroll O'Connor's strutting loudmouth to the quiet authority of James Sikking's Oswald-look-alike assassin. And Angie Dickinson has no equal as the essential sexual nonentity in a sleepwalker's story of imagined glory.
— David Thomson
•••••
At a time in the early fifties when film noir was dying in the States, Melville kept the torch alight—then handed back the flame to the Americans when Hollywood entered its modernist phase of noir with films like "Point Blank" which virtually reinvented the genre. Lee Marvin, the lethal "Walker," double-crossed and left for dead on Alcatraz, comes back from the grave to collect his money and can find only faceless executives and plastic cards. A fabulous, vicious allegory for modern corporate Amerca, filmed in a dreamlike, sensuous style, all of which may be the last few seconds of a dying man's thoughts.
— Chris Peachment, National Film Theatre, London
•••••
John Boorman's modernist, noirish thriller is still his best and funniest effort, despite some well-phrased demurrals about its cavalier treatment of Los Angeles from filmmaker Thom Andersen. Lee Marvin, betrayed by his wife and best friend, finds revenge when he emerges from prison. He recovers stolen money and fights his way to the top of a multiconglomerate--only to find absurdity and chaos. Boorman's treatment of cold violence and colder technology has lots of irony and visual flash--the way objects are often substituted for people is especially brilliant, while the influence of pop art makes for some lively 'Scope compositions--and the Resnais-like experiments with time and editing are still fresh and inventive. The accompanying cast (and iconography) includes Angie Dickinson, John Vernon, and Carroll O'Connor; an appropriate alternate title might be "Tarzan Versus IBM," a working title Jean-Luc Godard had for his Alphaville.
— Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader

Deliverance

(Beim Sterben ist jeder der Erste / Flußfahrt [de])

USA 1972
d: John Boorman
Warner Home Video (Region 2 de)

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Four Atlanta businessmen decide to prove that the frontier spirit is not dead by spending a canoeing weekend shooting the rapids of a river high in the Appalachians. Terrific boy's own adventure stuff with adult ingredients of graphic mutilation and buggery, but Boorman is never content either to leave it at that or to subscribe to the ecological concerns of James Dickey's novel (where man's return to nature becomes vital because 'the machines are going to fail, and then - survival'). Instead, he adds a dark twist of his own by suggesting that concern is too late. From the quartet's first strange encounter with the deformed albino child in a mountain community almost Dickensian in its squalor, down to the last scene where Voight watches coffins being unearthed and removed to safety before the new dam floods the valley, their trip down the river becomes an odyssey through a land that is already dead, killed by civilisation and peopled by alien creatures rather than human beings. Signposted by the extraordinary shot of a corpse, surfaced from the water with one arm grotesquely wrapped round its neck and the other pointing nowhere, it's a haunting, nightmarish vision.
— TM, Time Out Film Guide
•••••
It's too bad that this film has become better known for one disturbing scene of man-to-man sexual violence than as a whole film, because Deliverance is one of the best stories about men pushed to their physical and emotional limits ever put on screen. The movie has great action, drama, and suspense in a fascinating backwoods setting that enhances all three. Moreover, its "Heart of Darkness"-like storyline engages big questions of civilization versus instinct and morality versus necessity. "Deliverance" is directed with tense precision by John Boorman from a strong screenplay by James Dickey, who had authored the popular book of the same title. Vilmos Zsigmond's cinematography is brilliant throughout. He beautifully captures the awe and power of the wilderness and expresses visually what the unfortunate canoers come to learn: that nature, like the folks who inhabit it, can easily shift from serene to sinister. This was Burt Reynolds' breakthrough performance, and it's a showcase for his disarming charm and physical presence. Also impressive in their major film debuts are the two meeker members of the group, the ill-fated Ronny Cox and the nearly-as-ill-fated Ned Beatty. Jon Voight, then the only established star of the bunch, doesn't disappoint, and, through his subtly expressive face, we see how psychologically wounded the men are by their experience. But the real stars, arguably, are the hillbillies, who are frighteningly believable to say the least. Banjo-boy Hoyt Pollard endured two hours of make-up for his cosmetic inbreeding, and while he may not be a household name, his is easily one of the 1970s' most memorable, if brief, cinematic appearances. Just be warned: you'll never listen to a banjo the same way again.
— Matthew Doberman, AMG
•••••
This is a tough and powerful portrait of men out of their usual environment. Nor is the deplorable squalor of the mountain communities glossed over. This is not a film for the squeamish. Some have accused the film of exploiting rather than exploring the moments of violent drama culled from James Dickey's first novel while deemphasizing its ecological concerns. Others were troubled by the seemingly peverse beauty of the film. All agree, however, that the meeting between the uneasy quartet and a deformed albino mountain child is a highlight. Cox sees that the kid has a banjo, picks up his own, and strums a few notes. The boy answers him. Then the two challenge each other until both go at a frenzied pace banging out a mountain tune. This celebrated "Duelling Banjos" sequence is an eerie moment of grace before the violence begins.
Boorman's direction is gripping if a bit heavy-handed. The rapids scenes in particular are electrifying. Cinematographer Zsigmond presents breathtaking scenes that sear the memory. Reynolds excelled in this rare serious role. Dickey adapted his own novel and appears as a sheriff.
— TV MovieGuide

Zardoz

(Zardoz [de])

UK 1974
d: John Boorman
20th Century Fox Home Entertainment (Region 0 uk)

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A bizarre futurist fantasy which seems to have substituted itself when Boorman's plans to film Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings" fell through. Zardoz (joke ref: Wizard of Oz) is a vast, Blakean bust of a bearded Zeus which roams the air spewing arms and ammunition to its Exterminators on earth so that they may enforce the law: 'The gun is good, the penis is evil'. Liberated by the memory of a rape committed in the course of his liberties, one of these Exterminators (Connery) enters the godhead, kills the magician manipulating it, and finds he has penetrated the Vortex, a world of sterilised stasis established to preserve the sum of man's knowledge. At which point, poised to take off from its make love not war springboard, perhaps to explore the dichotomy between physical and spiritual forces, the script gradually falls apart into a mess of philosophical pottage under the whimsically pretentious Tolkien influence. But visually the film remains a sparkling display of fireworks, brilliantly shot and directed.
— TM, Time Out Film Guide
•••••
Probably John Boorman's most underrated film--an impossibly ambitious and pretentious but also highly inventive, provocative, and visually striking SF adventure with metaphysical trimmings. Set in a postapocalyptic society in 2293, it stars Sean Connery as a warrior and noble savage with dawning awareness; interestingly enough, the plot in many ways resembles that of Boorman's best film, "Point Blank".
— Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader
•••••
This infamous sci-fi opus is one of those rare cult films that actually lives up to its hype. Unfortunately for "Zardoz", its hype is double-edged -- this film is just as infamous for being muddled and self-indulgent as it is for being daring and brainy. The trouble begins at script level; John Boorman has packed his film with about three or four movies' worth of intriguing ideas, but this abundance of concepts comes at the expense of characterization depth and coherent storytelling. Boorman's direction is surprisingly uneven; many sequences are striking but just as many fall flat due to poor direction of extras and abrupt, indifferent transitions from one scene to the next. Also, like many science fiction films of the 1970s, the vision of futuristic design in "Zardoz" is so closely linked to the styles of its own era that its look has dated badly. However, "Zardoz" is not unwatchable despite such flaws. For one thing, all of the lead performances are quite good: Sean Connery gives a committed performance in an unusual role that is light years away from James Bond, and British stage vets like John Alderton and Sara Kestelman give straight-faced, serious performances that make the script's more out-there moments play in a believable fashion. "Zardoz" further benefits from a genuine sense of unpredictability -- it's virtually impossible to guess what strange event or otherworldly concept will be thrown your way next. It's a shame this sense of daring couldn't have been applied to a more focused, consistent story. To sum up, "Zardoz" is a brave misfire that might intrigue sci-fi cultists but is likely to confuse and confound most other viewers.
— Donald Guarisco, AMG
•••••
Der Film wird auf eine Art erzählt, die sich am besten als Gratwanderung zwischen Kitsch und Genalität bezeichnen lässt. Oft setzt er an, Elemente der Gesellschaften in solcher Überzeichnung darzustellen, dass man beinahe lächeln möchte. Doch dann zeigt sich - auf Grund der oben erwähnten Lückenhaftigkeit -, dass es einfach nur das fehlende Verständnis der Gesamtzusammenhänge ist, das so etwas wie "kitschige Hilflosigkeit" im Betrachter entstehen lässt. Etliche klischeehafte Situationen der Erzählung bricht Boorman auf diese Weise. Bildelemente - vom fliegenden Steinschädel über die überdrapierten Kostüme der Vortex-Bewohner bis hin zur Bebilderung der Wissenschaft - werden immer wieder mit ihrem Gegenteil konfrontiert und "entzaubert" und über alledem steht die stets unterschätzte und in ihrem Wollen undurchdringliche Erscheinung Zs, der mit amüsiertem und analysierendem Blick die Welt um sich herum zerfallen sieht.
"Zardoz" ist daher viel mehr als ein utopischer Film, mehr als ein Science Fiction: Er ist ein filmisches Experiment auf mehreren Ebenen. Er stellt Fragen über das "Was wäre wenn?" der gesellschaftlichen Zukunft genauso wie über das philosophische Klischee der "Agonie des ewigen Lebens". Er kontrastiert Szenen von unglaublicher Gewalt (Menschenjagden und Vergewaltigungen) mit dem vielfach variierten Allegretto aus Beethovens 7. Symphonie. Sicherlich: In seiner Hauptaussage, dass das Rohe schließlich (immer) über das Gekochte siegen wird, ist er in gewisser Weise "kulturrevolutionäres" Klischee. Aber dennoch verhindert die Offenheit seiner Erzählung und die Ambivalenz seiner Hauptfigur, dass sich dieses Thema zu sehr in den Vordergrund drängt.
Stefan Höltgen, F.LM

Excalibur

(Excalibur [de])

USA 1981
d: John Boorman
Warner Home Video (Region 1 us)

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Visually impressive but generally muddled and uneven adaptation of Malory's "Morte d'Arthur", both overlong and incoherent as it follows the quest for the Holy Grail and the climactic battle between Arthur and Mordred. Almost determinedly bizarre (or stupid?) in some of its characterisation - most notably Williamson's eccentric Merlin - it also adds a dash of gore and a touch of sex for good modernist measure. Nothing, however, can counter the film's inability to sway the emotions. For all its audacity, a misguided folly.
— GA, Time Out Film Guide
•••••
John Boorman's retelling of the Arthurian legends is a continuation of the thematic thrust and visual plan of his "Exorcist II", though the failure of that bold, hallucinatory, and flawed film seems to have put Boorman into partial retreat. There is humor here (in the form of a vaudeville Merlin, played by Nicol Williamson) as well as a diminution of scale that seems intended to help audiences through the thornier byways of Boorman's vision. But Boorman has not compromised in his temporal manipulations and his rigorous depsychologizing of his characters, which is where many viewers will have the most trouble. "The Waste Land" arrives via T.S. Eliot and "From Ritual to Romance", though this slightly threadbare interpretation doesn't distract from Boorman's personal concerns, which remain as proudly recondite as ever.
— Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader
•••••
One of the most ambitious, lavish productions of the Arthurian legend (as set forth in Sir Thomas Malory's "La Morte d'Arthur"), "Excalibur" largely fulfills its lofty pretenses. This is not a child's fairy tale, and director John Boorman fashions a violent, sexual world of swords, sorcerers, and seducers. "Excalibur" is a visual marvel, garnering Alex Thomson a well-deserved Oscar nomination for his cinematography (only the widescreen version of the film does his work justice). Boorman filmed in the lush hills of Ireland, and the movie is suffused with a misty, poetic feel that suits the tone of the material. The principals are generally stellar, and a variety of future leading men can be glimpsed in the supporting cast, including Gabriel Byrne, Patrick Stewart, and Liam Neeson. This is a big movie in every sense, and sometimes Boorman's desire to include everything in the film overwhelms him: the quest for the Holy Grail, for example, may strike some as confusing. "Excalibur" has detractors as enthusiastic as its fans, which can be said of any work as ambitious as this grandiose spectacle of a film.
— Matthew Doberman, AMG
•••••
Shot in Ireland, this is a visually stunning work of art with picturesque nature settings, an extravaganza of costumes and color, and enough optical tricks to bring out the child in us all. The screenplay by Boorman and Rospo Pallenberg offers us an opportunity to appreciate and explore the spellbinding ideas and ideals of the Arthurian myth. "Excalibur" easily moves beyond all the other screen treatments of this universal story and, thanks to a mesmerizing performance by Nicol Williamson as Merlin, it contains the humor, irony, and intelligence to make it a modern classic.
— Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality & Health Publishing

Hope and Glory

(Hoffnung und Ruhm [de])

UK 1987
d: John Boorman
MGM/UA Home Entertainment (Region 1 us)

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Boorman's autobiographical film about family life during the Blitz is subversively light on the blood, sweat, tears and sacrifice, and a joy throughout. Seen through the eyes of nine-year-old Bill Rohan (Rice Edwards), the war was a wonderland of superior fireworks displays every night, and adventure playgrounds of rubble and ruined houses. Dad joins up and Mum starts to see a lot of Dad's best friend Mac, while teenage sister Dawn runs wild with GIs. 'They know we're mad on jam' warns Mum, regarding a captured tin of German jam with deep suspicion; a barrage balloon breaks free of its moorings, bumps about the rooftops, and has to be shot down by a Home Guard firing squad. Tragedy is touched upon only in the episode of an orphan who refuses to leave her bombed home, and is offered a shrapnel collection by a sympathetic child. When the Rohan family are burned out, they take refuge with eccentric Granddad (Bannen, astonishingly good) at Shepperton on the river. The wind in the willows and the willow on the cricket ball - Boorman's long-lost England communicates its affectionate poetry.
— BC, Time Out Film Guide
•••••
John Boorman's account of the pleasures of the London blitz, mainly as experienced by himself as a seven-year-old (Sebastian Rice Edwards), is a lively look at the coziness of disaster filtered through nostalgia. The most thoroughly English film Boorman has made, it lacks the recklessness of his wide-screen adventures, but is an obvious labor of love that a superb cast--including Sarah Miles as the hero's mother, Sammi Davis (a delight) as his volatile teenage sister, and Ian Bannen as his irascible grandfather--helps to make funny and poignant. Anthony Pratt's flavorsome production design, re-creating the quaint optimism in the lower-income suburban housing of the period, is also a strong asset, as is the cinematography of Philippe Rousselot. But the love and enthusiasm that Boorman feels for his characters and subject carry the day here, and as evocative period re-creation, the film succeeds triumphantly in achieving everything that Radio Days set out (and failed) to do. The only lingering doubts one has concern the virtual absence of corpses, which is what makes Boorman's rosy-eyed view of the war possible.
— Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader
•••••
A superlative memoir of life in London during World War II from the unique perspective of a child, this ravishing drama from writer/director John Boorman is his thinly veiled autobiography and an essential work from his canon, arguably his single most important film. Much has been made of the film's fine performances, and they are indeed unforgettable, with young Sebastian Rice-Edwards suitably wide-eyed and vigorous as the hero, and Sammi Davis and Ian Bannen turning in career-high work as the main character's trampy sister and eccentric grandfather, respectively. What makes "Hope and Glory" a truly remarkable picture, however, is Boorman's keenly remembered, written, and re-created sense of a child's perception and how the mechanics of the adult world intrude upon it. Shifts in tone and mood occur rapid-fire at times, moving from such extremes as horror to humor to wonder in the same scene, as the filmmaker recalls the instant fluctuations of temperament and feeling that wash through a boy, particularly one subjected to the sensory overload of the London Blitz. When the film moves in its third act to a genteel country home where safety is found with a protective overseer, the change is jarring, but intentionally so. Presenting war as a joy and a thrill is an audacious act of artistic honesty and sets "Hope and Glory" in the same category as the same year's similarly underrated, under-seen "Empire of the Sun".
— Karl Williams, AMG

The General

(The General [de])

UK / Ireland 1998
d: John Boorman
Columbia Tristar Home Video (Region 1 us)

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Dublin, the 1980s and '90s. Martin Cahill (Gleeson) is forever a few steps ahead of the police, cocking a snook at all the authority figures he's detested since a childhood in the slums, defined by poverty, petty crime and priestly abuse. Determined to get his man, Inspector Ned Kenny (Voight) nevertheless views him with grudging respect, but it's only when he arranges full time surveillance that Cahill's loyal gang begin to buckle under pressure; even then, the self-styled Godfather can probably count on the support of his wife (Kennedy), her sister (Ball), his right-hand man Noel (Dunbar), and an amused, hero-hungry public, so that his pranks and perversions of justice go unpunished. But how long can he get away with refusing to hand over a portion of his spoils to the IRA? Boorman's energetic account of Cahill's real-life escapades (from the book by Paul Williams) is notable for its deft characterisations and authenticity: while Cahill's sentiments and actions are appreciated as the exploits of a canny born rebel, we're never allowed to forget that he's also volatile, violent and, whatever his feelings for his family, ultimately self-obsessed. All the performances are impressive, but Gleeson and Voight are especially memorable, lending an almost tragic air of inexorability to Cahill and Kenny's cat-and-mouse games.
— GA, Time Out Film Guide
•••••
John Boorman's docudrama about the contemporary Irish gangster Martin Cahill was critically acclaimed at Cannes as a return to form, though it flopped in London, allegedly because English teenagers couldn't countenance a black-and-white film. It's extremely competent, shot in 'Scope (Boorman's best screen format), and though it kept me absorbed it failed to win me over. I can no longer stomach the premise in so many Anglo-American crime pictures that mavericks are admirable simply because they're mavericks. Cahill's proud defiance of any authority, the basis of his legendary reputation, is proffered like an axiom for our uneasy awe. Boorman fills out this design with wit and polish, grandly assisted by Brendan Gleeson as Cahill, Jon Voight as his favorite adversary, and Maria Doyle Kennedy and Angeline Ball as his wife and sister-in-law (whom Cahill managed to romance simultaneously), but I still felt I was buying a very old suit of clothes. I'm told that Boorman objected to the jokey violence of GoodFellas; perhaps he undertook this project to express greater moral ambiguity about the underworld. But the same lesson is delivered far more effectively in pictures like "The Public Enemy" (1931) and "Scarface" (1932)--not to mention Boorman's own "Point Blank" (1967), which gives a surreal spin to the ambivalence.
— Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader
•••••
Was Boormans Film auszeichnet, ist jener poetische Schwebezustand, den wir aus seinen anderen Filmen kennen und der ihm auch immer wieder Kritik eingebracht hat: Man weiß nicht so recht, wohin das alles führen soll, die Mischung der Genres (hier Gangsterfilm, caper movie, Charakterstudie und politische Parabel), eine Erzählung zwischen dem Alten und dem Neuen, die keine Partei ergreift, keine Nutzanweisung generiert, die Zärtlichkeit einer Beobachtung, die immer wieder in Erschrecken umkippt (vor allem in den beiden Szenen des Gewaltausbruchs von Cahill) – in Bildern, die sich nie in erzählerischer Ökonomie erschöpfen. Dass diese Ästhetik der Schwebe hier so hervorragend funktioniert, hat zunächst mit einigen künstlerischen Entscheidungen des Regisseurs zu tun: Er hat die Hauptrolle, gegen den Willen der Mitproduzenten statt mit einem internationalen Star mit Brendan Gleeson besetzt, der dem wirklichen Martin Cahill nicht nur äußerlich ähnelt, sondern in seiner Bewegungsmelodie, in seinem sparsamen Spiel auch eine besondere Mischung von Distanz und Identifikation herstellt; wir sind ihm nahe, müssen aber nicht glauben, ihn vollständig zu verstehen.
In Jon Voight hat Gleeson einen gleichwertigen Partner, der die Verzweiflung, die Infektion eines Polizistenlebens an seinem Gegenüber deutlich macht. Gleeson ist die mythische Wiederkehr eines archaischen Helden, daher weder gut noch böse, Voight der moderne Mensch, der an ihm moralisch (schliesslich lässt auch er sich zu illegitimer Gewalt hinreißen) und kulturell zu Grunde geht. Zum anderen erzeugt die Entscheidung, den Film in CinemaScope und Schwarzweiß (d.h. mit nachträglich „entfärbtem" Farbmaterial) zu drehen, nicht nur eine dokumentarische Genauigkeit, sondern auch eine „abstrakte" (Boorman) Traum-Qualität: diese düsteren Ruinenlandschaften, in denen sich die Festungen der Moderne, die Banken, die Gerichtsgebäude, die Handelshäuser, eingenistet haben als neueste Architekturen des Kolonialismus, träumen sich ihren nicht minder düsteren Helden, Harlekin und Gespenst in einem, und es ist keineswegs alles gut an diesem Traum. Boorman widersteht der Versuchung, Cahill als neuen Robin Hood zu porträtieren, er hat eine große Zärtlichkeit für diesen neuen Barbaren und ist doch weit davon entfernt, ihn auch nur als Vorahnung einer „Lösung" zu sehen. Zum dritten ist The General eher ein musikalischer als ein erzählerischer Film. Die erste Szene nimmt Cahills Tod vorweg, und seine große Rückblende benutzt gleichsam eine Rondo-Form der wiederkehrenden Elemente, das Verhör, die Familie, der Raub, die Konstruktion des Alibis, die Spannungen in der Gang, der Zugriff der Öffentlichkeit, zur Komposition eines Stücks der Vergeblichkeit. Das Alte und das Neue, das Kolonialistische und das Kolonialisierte, kreisen ineinander, ohne eine historische Dimension zu erlangen. Die Fabel produziert zwischen story und history höchste poetische Intensität, aber keinen „Sinn". Uns Hoffnungen zu machen war noch nie eine Stärke von Boormans Filmen.
— Georg Seeßlen, epd film
•••••
Cahill is a fascinating mixture of brutality, criminal genius and eccentric charm -- it's not every man who'd first nail a friend's hands to a pool table, then drive him to the hospital -- but Boorman's determination to present his character as a boyishly innocent, latter-day Robin Hood flattens what could have been an intriguingly ambivalent portrait. That said, Boorman's original script is razor sharp and very funny, and Gleeson's portrayal is nothing short of brilliant: He's been accurately described as Ireland's answer to Gerard Depardieu. The film has little of the visual dazzle often associated with Boorman's movies (EXORCIST II, EXCALIBUR), but the somber, black-and-white cinematography helps even out the often larger-than-life tone.
— Ken Fox, TV MovieGuide

The Tailor of Panama

(Der Schneider von Panama [de])

USA / Ireland 2001
d: John Boorman
Columbia Tristar Home Video (Region 2 de)

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Smuggling, larceny, character assassination and subversion: John le Carré and his collaborator John Boorman get away with murder here. Under the guise of turning out an exotic spy thriller starring 007 himself - Pierce Brosnan - Boorman has instead fashioned a deft, dapper, quintessentially English comedy playing on our aggrandised post-colonial self-image. As Harry Pendel (Geoffrey Rush) puts it: 'We each of us have a dream of ourselves to be more than we are.' That goes double for MI6 man Andy Osnard (Brosnan), an unscrupulous scoundrel prepared to incite an international incident if he smells money in it. Exiled to Panama in disgrace, Osnard immediately insinuates himself into high society, using gentleman's tailor Harry as his conduit. Blackmailed and flattered, bullied and bribed, Harry dreams up an entire rebel movement - 'the Silent Opposition' - to boost Osnard's spending allowance. When that begins to flag, the pair concoct a mind-boggling intrigue in which Panama plans to sell the Canal to the Chinese. It's the biggest thing to hit British Intelligence since Suez. Le Carré's 1996 novel acknowledged a debt to Our Man in Havana, and Geoffrey Rush's performance might have been modelled on Alec Guinness: he makes Harry an endearingly decent mediocrity, a romantic whose sincerity far exceeds his honesty - making him easy prey for Brosnan's venal opportunist, casually suave to his very soul. (Brosnan so clearly relishes this chance to make mischief with Bond's credibility, it's hard to see how he can be trusted with the franchise again.) Working in a lighter register, Boorman has crafted a witty, classy and richly enjoyable morality play, which skewers the mercenary self-interest behind Anglo-American imperialism almost as an afterthought.
— TCh, Time Out Film Guide
•••••
Much too talky. But some of the talk is by John Le Carré, who adapted his own novel with Andrew Davis and director John Boorman. And Pierce Brosnan, who plays a British spy, puts an arch spin on his James Bond credentials. They help this semicomedy claim the oxymoronic status of being an Austin Powers movie for grown-ups. Brosnan's spy enlists a cockney ex-con (Geoffrey Rush) who's working as a tailor for the rich and famous to be his main contact; other significant characters include the tailor's wife (Jamie Lee Curtis) and business partner (Leonor Varela) and a British diplomat (Catherine McCormack) the spy is pursuing. If you don't find the cynicism of this mordant look at corruption too distasteful--and ideologically speaking, it's certainly an improvement over Boorman's "Beyond Rangoon"--you're likely to have a fair amount of fun.
— Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader
•••••
The story begins in the blackly comic tradition of Graham Greene's OUR MAN IN HAVANA, then spirals into something very near to tragedy. Director John Boorman's storytelling conceits don't always work, but this slippery tale is solid enough to wriggle through the rough patches, which include the appearance of Pendel's late Uncle Benny (playwright Harold Pinter) whenever Pendel has a moral decision to make. Uncle Benny invariably advises lying or denying, which is amusing enough, but feels jarring in this otherwise realistic — if utterly absurd — milieu.
— Maitland McDonagh, TV MovieGuide