Too demanding movie (for an average viewer)

Rating: 4/10 (1 February 2012)

Through the period of the cold war I was a kid but I do remember it and everybody knew there's something going on "behind the curtains". But what? This movie does not explain anything. On the contrary - it shows how entirely absurd the whole thing was. Idelogy? What ideology? They were all the same. People were spying each other, betraying, killing and so on for no real reason (maybe money, but even that is doubtful). All "affairs" were just construction, one over the other, and all of them somewhere in the clouds. That's how I perceive this movie and the period described. Requires too much attention and background knowledge. Too much happening in too little time. One barely (if at all) distinguishes who is who in one scene, and here is already another with something totally different. Confusing and boring, yet beautifully photographed. The cast is full of "stars" but why? None of them really has a chance to show anything impressive. There are more characters than in local phone book. Everything is sacrificed for the plot, which probably 100 people in the world understand. I'm not amongst them. The only reason I could recommend this film is testing your patience. Sorry, but nothing more than that.