Cold War history told with Spielberg style and Hanks talent

Rating: 10/10 (20 October 2015)

This Cold War history describes (with Spielberg drama) a tense time in American history, when the US and Soviets were immersed in tensions that had the potential of engaging the world in a nuclear war.Tom Hanks portrays the insurance lawyer James Britt Donavan, who was recruited to become a patriotically motivated defense attorney for Soviet KGB Colonel Vilyam Fisher, known as "Rudolf Abel", who was caught by the FBI and eventually convicted for espionage. Subsequently, Donavan was asked to negotiate a prisoner swap between Abel and the downed U2 spy pilot, Francis Gary Powers, an event that occurred on February 10, 1962, on Glienicke Bridge in Berlin. There are several layers to this historic film challenging our concepts about justice. Hanks brilliantly carried Donavan's dignity with credibility throughout a somewhat complicated plot. There's something for every movie goer in this excellent movie- there's history, drama, espionage and emotional human dignity. Excellent cinematography during the scene when Powers and his U2 reconnaissance airplane are hit with a surface to air missile is particularly exciting. Additionally interesting are the scenes describing how Americans were immersed with Cold War paranoia and showing the "duck and cover" drills taught in public schools. Mark Rylance gives a brilliantly superb performance as the Russian spy Rudolf Abel. "Bridge of Spies" is a serious, albeit entertaining, history lesson about an incident that had the potential to change the world as we knew it, but proved how cooler negotiating heads somehow prevailed, in spite of international tensions. A wonderful movie that will extend its appeal for generations.