One easy criticism of The Constant Gardener is that like so many other movies of its kind, it uses the misery of the developing world as an exotic backdrop for a story about the travails of white people. Fair enough, except that it is precisely the moral failures and obligations of the wealthy world that are at issue here. It is also worth noting that Meirelles is from Brazil, a country whose social and political landscape may resemble Kenya's more than Britain's. One cannot help but feel that his camera -- operated by the exceptionally gifted Uruguayan cinematographer Cesar Charlone -- feels more at home in the rusty heat of Africa than in the chilly, gray austerity of Europe. There is, in his beautiful, crowded frames, a palpable tension between foreground and background, a sense that the real human scale of the story is not to be found in the fates of Justin and Tessa, however affecting these may be.
This is, in other words, a movie acutely aware of its own limitations. Meirelles's previous film, City of God, a Scorsesean epic of the Rio slums, also tried to embed social concern within the conventions of pop filmmaking. It was a bit of an awkward fit, especially at those moments where the horror of real-world brutality shattered the gangster bravado. This time, constrained by the screenwriter Jeffrey Caine's nimble streamlining of Le Carre's book, the director manages a more consistent tone, and implies more violence than he shows. There are nonetheless scenes -- in particular a rebel raid on a refugee camp in Sudan -- whose sheer cinematic intensity makes them more dazzling than appalling.
But that is always the risk of making entertainment out of the world's troubles, an undertaking that is nonetheless worthwhile and that few have pursued as long or as well as Le Carre. The world has changed since the end of the cold war, which was his great subject, and The Constant Gardener can stand as an example of how thriller-making has become more difficult.
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