A tired CIA field agent is given a last-chance assignment to protect a numbers station in a remote part of England. When the station comes under siege, can his talent and her brains find them a way out alive?
Slightly atmospheric but not terribly sexy, this spy thriller is a perfect vehicle for Cusack. What does it say about a guy who is consistently typecast as either the lovable everyman in High Fidelity or the hitman with a heart in Grosse Pointe Blank? What does that say about us, the viewing public, who will accept him as either type?
In this case he is the CIA hitman with a heart, Emerson Kent, who refuses a kill and as a result gets sent to the backwoods of England on a baby-sitting assignment at a numbers station. His protectee, Katherine (Akerman), is a brilliant cryptologist who reads the numbers over the air to send various CIA teams stationed in Europe on their assignments.
Longtime fodder for conspiracy theorists and cryptology hobbyists, tying in the numbers stations in this manner can be a bit sketchy... at least as presented in this film. Field agents' books would have to be the size of phonebooks to cover all possible variables in the field using only one page at a time... and why would they have variables covered for the assassinations of fifteen of their top people?
But explaining numbers stations isn't the point... the point is the human factor. At every turn, it is revealed that the human beings behind the mechanism are the real weakness. The former agent who defected to the other side, revealing the ins and outs of the stations. The babysitter who fell in love with his ward and couldn't terminate her as per protocol, allowing the kill orders to be sent. Only once was the feeling human factor shown in a positive light, and that was when Kent refused his kill order... although one might argue that Katherine risking her life to cancel one last broacast counts as well. You will have to be the judge.
I may not be as smart as the people depicted in this film, but I appreciate intelligent film presented with no condescension. This is one of those films. Surprisingly, despite the number of digits being said on the screen, this is not a bad film for knitters or crocheters, either. There are two sticky spots at the beginning and end of the film, but otherwise the only thing preventing getting your craft on is the tension and action you may stop and watch when it gets good.
While there were no laugh out loud moments, or holy crap moments, I did drop my hook three times for tense sequences. I loved this movie. Five out of five stars. And if you're a fan of spy thrillers in general, the under $9 price point for either the DVD or Blu-Ray version makes it well worth adding to your collection.
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