The Interpreter (2005)

It's been a long time since I've seen something that can truly be called a "political thriller." The genre doesn't seem to be as popular as it once was and the movies that do get made are either too complex for most people, myself included, to understand (think Syriana) or just aren't very interesting. But with Sean Penn and Nicole Kidman in the leading roles and director Sydney Pollack behind the lens, it seemed that The Interpreter would be a solid new entry in the category.

Kidman stars as Silvia Broome, an American citizen who grew up in Africa but has been living in the U.S. and working as an interpreter at the United Nations for several years. She once lived in a (fictional) war-torn country named Matobo, where she lost her mother, father, and sister at an early age when their car tripped a landmine. After that, Silvia and her brother Simon took up the cause of opposition guerillas intent on overthrowing president Edmond Zuwanie (played by Earl Cameron) because of the many "crimes against humanity" he perpetrated in Matobo. But then Broome decided that she could best serve her country through diplomacy and used her language skills at the U.N. instead.

One day after work, Broome realizes that she forgot some items in the sound booth above the General Assembly floor. While there, one of the headphone sets in the booth picks up a transmission of people talking down on the floor. The lights are off and nobody's supposed to be there, so an intrigued Broome picks up the headphones and promptly overhears that there's going to be an assassination attempt made on Zuwanie when he comes to speak before the General Assembly in a couple of days. Broome had flicked the light switch on when she entered the booth, and now realizes that she could clearly be seen by the people on the floor.

Broome reports the overheard conversation first to U.N. security officials, then to the Secret Service. A man named Tobin Keller (Penn) and his partner Dot Woods (Catherine Keener) are assigned to the case. Keller doesn't necessarily believe Broome's story right off the bat because, as he says, some people just "like the attention." He orders a polygraph for Broome, which comes back as inconclusive. So Keller must follow up on the case just in case Broome is telling the truth.

From there, the rest of the movie deals with the investigation into the alleged assassination attempt, as well as a closer look into Broome's past to see if she's everything that she claims to be.

I have to say that I thought The Interpreter was a good, but not great, movie. Of course Penn and Kidman were excellent in their roles. They are both Oscar winners and I know that they can make any movie they're in even better. The main plotline was compelling enough to maintain my interest throughout most of the 2-hour running time, and I found that I could follow along with what was going on reasonably well.

However, there were some things that just didn't make sense in the plot, where characters seem to contradict themselves and their earlier motivations without rhyme or reason. This is not, as some people might think, the fault of the screenwriter, but usually is an indication that the script has been through several rewrites and has been tinkered with by someone other than the original writer (which was definitely the case for this movie). At any rate, once the characters' actions started not to make sense, I found that I didn't really care who the would-be assassin was.

In addition, I thought the ending wasn't very satisfying at all. It didn't resolve anything and left me feeling as though there were still too many unanswered questions. As a viewer, I feel that my reward for sitting through a movie should be to get answers to all the questions that are brought up during the course of the film, but that didn't happen here.

Overall, The Interpreter wasn't quite the caliber of movie I expected it to be with names like Penn, Kidman, and Pollack attached to it. But it wasn't bad either and would be a decent choice for your next DVD rental.