Saw Breach over the weekend

...and I highly recommend it. The reviewers who compared it to Shattered Glass are spot-on. Same director and same essential plot: we know from the beginning that Glass/Hanssen were caught and the story is about how the people around them put it together. When I saw know from the beginning, I mean the beginning: the first shot of the movie was Ashcroft announcing Hanssen's arrest. Chris Cooper was absolutely magnificent as Hanssen -- again, to borrow from Shattered Glass, you know that he is doing absolutely terrible things and, in a weird way, you still empthasize with him. As a viewer, you go from despising Hanssen as the boss from hell to respecting him and even liking him a little bit (very similiar to the way Phillippe's character views him). I was pleasantly surprised by Ryan Phillippe as the rookie agent who was basically given the job of getting the info necessary to nail Hanssen dead to rights. And any movie with President Palmer I/Pedro Cerrano (Dennis Haysbert) and Lumbergh/Reese Bobby (Gary Cole) in supporting roles is worth the $8 to see.

 

And I just saw Shattered Glass last night (from Netflix) -- a must-see, for sure.

 

Definitely a four-star flick. Recommend it to all.

 

"shattered glass" was wonderful. looking forward to "breach." 8)

 

There was a really good interview on NPR's "Fresh Air" a couple of weeks ago with the director and the guy who Ryan Phillippe played in the movie. The director tried to interview Robert Hanssen while he was working on the screenplay, even sent him a bunch of questions. Hanssen didn't respond.

 

Definitely worth seeing. I had a plot-hole question:

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The kid goes back to his apartment, Hanssen and wife are there. Kid's wife says she tried the beeper and got no answer. I thought only Laura Linney's character had the beeper number....Not to mention that the kid then obviously lies about being at his mother's place, which seems like the kind of thing the paranoid Hanssen would check out. (ie, fake sympathy call to the mom the next day during which he casually mentions that the kid was there the night before so that mom would unknowingly confirm or deny.)

In real life, btw, Hanssen never unexpectedly showed up at the apartment.

Not saying this ruined the movie by any means, I just thought it was sloppy. But maybe I'm missing something.


Edit: In case I'm not clear -- Hanssen and wife show up; the kid's not there. Hanssen tells kid's wife to try him on the beeper. As a result:

1) Wife says "What beeper?," which would be a red flag to Hanssen.

2) Wife actually knows the beeper number, dials it and battery really is dead, which would be a major screw-up that Laura Linney's character would never tolerate.

3) Wife realizes what's going on and so dials a random number to fake out Hanssen. But that seems unlikely because she's pissed at her husband for keeping her in the dark.

And yes, I realize I'm overthinking this.

 

I thought it was pretty good.
As for the beeper, I assumed he bought another beeper and gave the wife the number, to make her complicit in then ruse without her knowledge.

 

The Seond Beeper Theory.

Possibly, although it requires that the kid (I wish I remember his name) really did let the battery run down on that wife beeper.

 

When I look at Chris Cooper, I see John Laroche.

 

Saw it Saturday as well and I thought it was great.

 

Just saw it, and yes, it was really good. If I hadn't known how it would turn out, I'd have been thinking, damn, Hanssen's going to figure this out at some point. The scene where they're at the CIA and Pedro Cerrano's guys have the car completely disassembled is priceless.

 

Knowing how it turns out from the beginning made it even better than being a mystery. Cooper seemed one tick from a raging pedophile, and Philippe was surprisingly effective.