Film review: A Most Wanted Man was Philip Seymour Hoffman's final film
Philip Seymour Hoffman plays an old-school spymaster drifting in perpetual weariness in his last completed film, A Most Wanted Man. A much-condensed treatment of the 2008 novel by John le Carré, this subdued espionage drama is a seamless showcase of the late actor's aptitude in channelling the wounded spirit of a genius.
Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Rachel McAdams, Willem Dafoe, Robin Wright
Director: Anton Corbijn
Category: IIA
Philip Seymour Hoffman plays an old-school spymaster drifting in perpetual weariness in his last completed film, A Most Wanted Man. A much-condensed treatment of the 2008 novel by John le Carré, this subdued espionage drama is a seamless showcase of the late actor's aptitude in channelling the wounded spirit of a genius.
Set in contemporary Hamburg, from where Mohamed Atta and co-conspirators formulated the 9/11 attacks, the latest feature from Anton Corbijn depicts the delicately contradicting intentions of American and German intelligence officers, who all seem to share a lingering sense of anguish.
As the half-Chechen, half-Russian Muslim Issa Karpov (Grigoriy Dobrygin) mysteriously emerges in the German port city's Islamic community and lays claim to the huge fortune left behind by his corrupt Russian military father, German intelligence operative Günther Bachmann (Hoffman) senses an opportunity to entrap Dr Faisal Abdullah (Homayoun Ershadi), a Muslim humanitarian he believes to be bankrolling terrorists.
While his rival officers are keen to take Karpov off the streets right away, Bachmann — in keeping with other archetypal le Carré heroes, such as George Smiley — prefers the long game, a strategy vaguely supported by the hovering CIA agent Martha Sullivan (Robin Wright, pictured with Hoffman). Is Karpov really an extremist? Or the traumatised refugee that he appears to be — and the pawn in Bachmann's ambitious plan?