Would've Been Better as a Mini-Series

Rating: 4/10 (23 May 2007)

I had heard in reviews that there was not much action in this study of a man who kept his life a secret. I also read that the tone of this film was akin to "Smily's People", a famous mini-series about spying during the cold war. While watching this lengthy history of Ed Wilson and the CIA, I was disappointed how it seemed each setup cutaway before we could really absorb what was going on. Then I realised the problem, this should have been a mini- series. The essential problem was trying to cover such a huge amount of history, but forced to stay focused on our main character. This caused the screenplay to hack off the meat of the material just to be able to follow the single arc of Mr. CIA. At the very least, we should've been given more background to the supporting players. Also, even though it is certainly accurate how his wife was alienated, it made for repetitive and depressing screen time. I think one mistake was casting such a mega-star with so much luggage and such huge lips. It made it impossible for me to buy Angelina Jolie as the wife, it would have been better to cast someone a little less well known.
So I have many major complaints about this film, but only that I wish the screenplay was structured to supply more depth into what the heck Wilson was doing, and less into an uninteresting domestic life that goes nowhere. We are shown more than enough to get it. Also, in this day and age of much gripping portraits of the underworld ("Syriana"), this approach of 'less-is-less' film-making is a couple decades out of date.
Update 9/6/2012: Showtime is now developing this movie into a series. Thanks for taking my advice!