Breach

Last night I went alone to see Breach. It's the story of the capture of FBI super-traitor Robert Hanssen. I love Chris Cooper (Hanssen), and Ryan Phillipe (agent Eric O'Neill) is always enjoyable to look at. The movie is actually better than I expected, it's a good story to start with.

Chris Cooper is his usual dour but interesting self. I heard a radio interview with him on NPR last year and he is just as serious in real life as the characters he plays... zero sense of humor. Laura Linney is also just great as O'Neill's boss Kate Burroughs. I'm not sure why she has yet to achieve Streep status but I think she's that good, perhaps a little on the chilly side. I wish Ryan Phillipe was a better actor. He sure tries hard but there's no way he could have carried this movie without Cooper and Linney along for the ride. He just doesn't have it.

The movie has all the requisite spy plot twists and gimmicks- bugged offices, cars being tailed, our hero escaping detection at the last possible second every time he snoops around his boss' office. My one big complaint is that we are supposed to believe that Hanssen more or less let himself be duped by O'Neill due to some kind of spy burn-out.