A Most Wanted Man Review.
A Most Wanted Man,
one of late Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s last performances, is essentially a
thriller about the paranoia of terrorism directed by Anton Corbjin (Control, The American). The film focuses
on a Muslim Russian, Issa (Dobrygin) who has come to Germany illegally and is
considered by the Russian government to be an extremely dangerous terrorist. An
espionage agent who focuses on Muslims gathers information on this Russian and
believes him to also be a terrorist. Issa gains a lawyer (Rachel McAdams) who
goes out of her way to help him by getting in touch with banker (Willam Dafoe)
involving money that Issa’s father had left him.
The film is very dialogue based and has little action unlike
a lot of espionage thrillers are; this trait requires a lot of attention whilst
watching and a lot of patience as it can be slightly paced out at times. The
acting is definitely the main praise of this film; Phillip Seymour Hoffman is
always good in everything I’ve seen him in and it really is a loss to the film
industry that he’s passed. Dobrygin gives a very captivating performance,
showing vulnerability and honesty.
Speaking of honesty, this is a film that lacks it. The whole
film is very paranoid about Muslims being terrorists and almost everybody in
the film is unfaithful to someone one way or another, including Rachel McAdams
who seems to be very genuine towards
Issa. The irony about it all that the only character in the film that is
completely honest throughout is Issa who is completely misunderstood in the
film.
The characters’ performances in A Most Wanted Man definitely make this film worth watching as they
give off so much emotion you actually care about the outcome. My only problem
would be is I wasn’t particularly happy with the ending – I usually like
ambiguous ends that let the viewer decide what happens but in this instance I left
wanting to know the future of the characters.