Product: Tailor of Panama [VHS] (2001)
Rating: 4.0
Brosnan steals the show
This is an excellent version of LeCarre's novel about spying in Panama. I have always enjoyed watching Brosnan as James Bond, and I suspect he enjoyed this role even more than 007. Brosnan's character is everything that Bond is not. He is loathsome, untrustworthy and completely immoral. I really enjoyed his scenes with Rush as he plays a cut-rate Mephisto and gets Rush to sell his soul. Jamie Lee Curtis is solid as Rush's wife, but it is Brosnan who really steals the show.LeCarre's inversion of the glamour world of espionage has a ring of authenticity. No one in their right mind would enter into it. Everyone is either corrupt or a fool or both. It is dangerous and vile. Panama exudes the atmosphere of many film noir cities of decadence and decline - as Rush - the Tailor - makes his moral descent.Also interesting is the scathing satire of British and American spies as they bid to outdo each other and look like fools as Brosnan's crazed plan takes shape.