September and October usually offer some refuge for cinema fans sick of seeing aliens shooting robots, wizards or vampires. Films out this month like Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Drive are a refreshing change from the summer fare that have managed to impress and, in the case of the spy drama, succeed at the box office too. Can The Debt, which aims for a similarly cerebral feel with a dash of action, be added to the ranks? Well, yes, actually.
Written by X-Men First Class director Matthew Vaughn and directed by John Madden, The Debt is a clever, novel and interesting little thriller that manages to feel fresh and engaging throughout. The setup in deceptively simple – in 1965, three agents of Mossad (Sam Worthington, Jessica Chastain and Martin Csokas) are tasked with killing a deadly Nazi known as the Surgeon of Birkenau, and seemingly manage to pull it off successfully, making them national heroes whether they deserved it or not However fast forward to 1997 where the trio – played by Ciaran Hinds, Helen Mirren and Tom Wilkinson and the reality of what actually happened constantly plagues them and hangs over them.
As you can see, it’s not the most complex scenario but it’s cleverly done, and manages to have a good few surprises up it’s sleeve. The casting in general is very good – particularly Hinds and Chastain, both of whom are having big years after the release of Tree of Life and Tinker Tailor – and a for a film that could quite easily have turned into some direct-to-dvd affair it’s well directed and technically very good, with the sixties scenes looking especially impressive. Sure, some of the action and more frenetic scenes may be in debt (I’m so sorry) to a lot of other action movies like Salt, Bourne etc, but overall the movie manages to have it’s own identity and is very memorable – mainly because there are no big heroes here, instead we get a depiction of three very real and very human characters, and the anguish they’ve had to live with is conveyed extremely well. As a result, the film is sorely lacking in laughs or any sense of fun, but much like Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, you’re hopefully too drawn into the storyline and characters to notice. Without wanting to venture into the murky waters of spoiler territory, the film succeeds in having a great conclusion following some increased action and it’s a very satisfying payoff.
I wasn’t sure what to expect from The Debt – apparently it’s been on the shelf for quite a while before release – but thanks to some generally spot-on casting, a pretty unique setting and a gripping storyline it has emerged as one of my surprise highlights of this time of the year.
