Nicole Kidman plays the title role in this movie of the same name, while Sean Penn plays the Secret Service agent assigned to protect her after she overhears inside the UN a threat on the life of the leader of a fictional African country.
This is the first film ever to be shot inside the UN Headquarters in New York. Political intrigue and deception unfold in such locations as the General Assembly and the Security Council, as well as the corridors and hallways of the complex.
According to a BBC review, the two main characters are a bit unbelievable, but the stars still manage to be absorbing and carry the film -- Kidman with her pretty vulnerability and Penn with his rugged sadness -- despite the shaky logic and plot problems. For example, why would an emotionally unstable agent be put in charge of such a sensitive case, or why wouldn't the interpreter be placed in protective custody immediately?
Plot problems or no, The Interpreter's director Sydney Pollack has masterfully created a suspenseful ride, if you're willing to suspend your disbelief.
Kirk Honeycutt calls the film "a meditation on a postmodern world bedeviled by regional tyrants and global terrorism."
Kidman is the southern African-born UN translator Silvia Broome who just happens to understand the rare language in which the threat against the dictator of the fictional African state of Matobo is spoken.
PHOTOS COURTESY OF UNIVERSAL
Penn is the grief-hardened Secret Service agent Tobin Keller assigned to figure out whether she's telling the truth. Ominous moves against Silvia make it seem like she is, yet facts about her history paint her as a possible conspirator.
But time is of the essence as Sylvia, Tobin and various agencies race to prevent an assassination at the UN General Assembly, where the dictator will speak. (Somehow, for political reasons, the dictator is unable to cancel his speech).
"Evidence, hunches and even dead bodies turn up too fast and furiously for even the most attentive audience member to track," writes Honeycutt.
Even the most the furiously-paced thriller has time to show a developing relationship between the lead characters, as The Interpreter demonstrates.
The two move from mutual suspicion to sympathy and understanding. They are both emotionally harried individuals who lean on their jobs like a crutch. Their
relationship is not a romantic one, but rather a journey of learning to trust one another when they have no one else.
A few other themes give The Interpreter some substance. The film raises the issue of how to confront brutal tyranny without resorting to the same tactics. "Vengeance is a lazy form of grief," Silvia says. It seems quite fitting for a representative of the UN to preach patience and forgiveness to an agent of the US government.
According to Honeycutt, the movie has two jaw-dropping sequences: one on a moving bus and the other at the UN itself, with both making the price of admission worthwhile.
The filming at the UN headquarters took place from April to August last year, on weekends, so as not to disrupt operations during the regular work week of the organization. In one scene where a shot is fired at an actor, the use of real blanks had to be foregone due to a security council meeting that was taking place. Some of the film's extras are actual UN staff members -- who were allowed to participate after signing the usual waivers.
Filming was originally scheduled to take place in Toronto, where a replica of the UN General Assembly was underway until it was discovered that having curved fluorescent bulbs made in the arched shape of the desks would be extremely costly.
This contributed to a renewed effort to film at the UN headquarters which was successful due to a deal that Mayor Bloomberg's office worked out with the producers where the entire movie would have to be shot in New York using New York crews.
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