MOVIE REVIEW: “Bridge of Spies” Features a Battle of Words

The world on the height of the cold war leads to citizens being divided, and ideologies questioned. These are most of the elements that was featured on Spielberg’s newest ventures to documenting the world’s greatest wars. Only in this venture features a small story that has a much greater impact in our young earth’s history as one wouldn’t expect. The same can be said in Steven Spielberg’s perfectly directed 2 ½ hour long thriller talky, Bridge of Spies.

Plot Summary:

Bridge of Spies is based on the true events of what led to the 1962 Spy Swap at Glienicker Bridge during the Cold War. The film opens five years earlier when a senior KGB spy, Rudolf Abel (Mark Rylance) was captured by the FBI in the United States. An insurance lawyer, James Donovan (Tom Hanks) has agreed to defend the captured spy of an enemy state as he uses all of his wit and will to undertake this impossible task despite the obstructive court and a noisy public that only wants to see Abel hanged. It wasn’t until years later when an American pilot, Francis Gary Powers was captured by the soviets and have Donovan be tapped to head to East Berlin and negotiate a swap between Abel and Powers for their freedom.

The Battle of Words

When you see any promotional material where the posters have American flags layered over Tom Hanks’ face or even the title “Bridge of Spies’ would lead to someone thinking this would be another spy blockbuster of the year packed with action and star spangling awesomeness. But in reality this was more on the nature of Corbijn’s “The American” or Alfredson’s “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy” than it is Mendes’ Skyfall or even zanier in the nature of Pierce’s Bond films. Instead of gun shooting, explosions, and car chases we have a battle of words wherein the film’s thrills are based upon the dialogue being shared between the characters much so like the opening scene of the film with minimal dialogue and zero score Spielberg’s approach on this material to be more engaging in a way that basks upon the quietness.

The film is pretty much two different movies; the first half being a courtroom drama and the next being a spy thriller. It also makes this film a remarkable exploration of the past’s paranoid culture and how it cleverly mirrors the society we are currently living in. The film is an exploration of the culture of the past, with in which he doesn’t shy away from showing the bad side of all of the people going through the difficulty of countries at the middle of the cold war without gratuitously antagonizing both Germany and America and more so making a commentary towards doing the “right thing” without sacrificing our ideals. This is where the bad comes in for me; the thing about this film is that this has too much of an positive outlook throughout the entire movie, the film never lets you doubt the actions Hanks’ Donovan would go through as if there aren’t any stakes at all. Lacking that “punch” throughout the film’s final act as every situation ends gift wrapped and tied with a pretty little bow on top. Sure, those were liberties but it still feels respectful for what inspired these events and even so works for the cinematic purpose for the film’s audience.

Breathing life to the characters

Despite my complaints of how Donovan was portrayed like this perfect superhero, Hanks does what he does best in this film and it is that he breathes enough life to the everyman. The film may have had some dark undertones but it never stops him from cracking some well-timed jokes, there were some clever comedic dialogue where even some law jargon went into play, enough for him to balance a more serious and light hearted performance. Of course, there is someone who has leveled with Hanks performance and it is Mark Rylance who plays Rudolf Abel. He was never in a lot of the scenes of the film, but his quiet and somber performance does shed some light to the film and that he does play well with Hanks as they were together in a scene side by side.

Conclusion:

Even though the film lacks a powerful punch in the last act, Bridge of Spies is a near-perfect experience; It’s no surprise to anybody when I end up saying that Spielberg made another tremendous and Oscar-worthy film and the same can be said to Tom Hanks performing brilliantly with co-star, Mark Rylance rising to the occasion. The film is of course backed up by some of the best shot and involving scenes by Cinematographer, Janusz Kasinski, Newman’s inspiring score and well put together writing by Matt Charman and the Coen Brothers. With all of these gears in the machine, they were able to make another excellent war drama that never drags down.