The Recruit is a big-time, star-driven Hollywood thriller that turns out to be a bit of a sham.
While it is entertaining enough, as well as slick and glossy, and while it shows Irishman Colin Farrell's ability to pose as an American in a big studio film, the movie is an emotional and intellectual void.
For example, it is ridiculously easy to guess the major plot "surprise" about one third of the way into the piece.
That is much too early. And that is because the screenplay -- credited to Roger Towne, Kurt Wimmer and Mitch Glazer -- is formulaic, relying on a gimmick for its climax.
The Recruit is the story of a hip computer genius (Farrell) who is recruited as a spy trainee by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency's top instructor (Al Pacino).
The new kid, who is emotionally vulnerable because of mysteries surrounding the death of his father on a CIA mission in 1990, is swept into training at The Farm, the legendary CIA school for recruits.
The bombastic Pacino becomes a surrogate father for Farrell's confused character.
During training, our flawed hero also ends up in love with another recruit (Bridget Moynahan, coincidentally engaged to a CIA supergeek, Ben Affleck, in The Sum Of All Fears).
Later, fresh out of The Farm, the key players are all at work on spy business and the mechanics of the plotting take over. Someone among the recruits may be a traitor. Oh horrors!
Character development is, unfortunately, pushed aside in favour of staging the kind of incidents expected in thrillers: Chases, gunfights and tricky spy things.
Few sophisticated elements, such as computer programs, are explained in any detail. Things are kept simplistic, even stupidly so.
The Recruit was shot primarily on location in the Toronto area, including the fictional Farm training centre.
Some exteriors were shot in the Washington, D.C., region for authenticity. CIA shill Chase Brandon, who also worked on The Sum Of All Fears, served as a technical consultant and the recreation of the CIA headquarters at Langley is supposedly pretty accurate. For what that's worth.
Reading so far, you might wonder why I gave The Recruit even a two-and-half star rating. The answer is the interesting Pacino-Farrell and Farrell-Moynahan chemistry at The Farm.
Pacino is a legend in Hollywood, of course, but he is at his best when apparently doing the least.
His performance in Insomnia last year was a brilliant study in employing his idiosyncrasies to invent a character, not merely show off his tics.
In the early passages of The Recruit, Pacino does that again, although some big overwrought scenes later in the flick are examples of Pacino at his scenery-chewing worst.
Moynahan has a sexy strength. As for Farrell, he embodies sensual star power without the necessity of being in control.
In fact, he is most interesting in The Recruit when he is feral, unpredictable and feeling abandoned.
Expect great things from this guy in future movies.
(This film is rated PG)
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