Reel Society

The American

George Clooney has turned in some dazzling dramatic performances over the years - Michael Clayton and Syriana immediately spring to mind - and the reason that he has left his mark on those roles was because of his ability to don the garb of whatever role he's in, making us forget for a short time that's he's one of the most famous thespians on the planet.  His characters are invariably multi-faceted, deeply layered, and easily relatable.  So the idea of him playing an assassin was a tantalizing thought, and I thought that The American would be yet another in long string of triumphs.

Sadly, this was not the case.

The pitfall that so often sinks dramas like this is that the plots tend to be overly complicated, and come off as contrived or convoluted.  The problem with The American was exactly the opposite - the plot was so simple, the whole script comes off as lazy.  Attempts to give the story or the characters much depth were few and far between, and by the end, all I could do was shake my head and say, "Was that it?"

Clooney plays Jack, to whom we are introduced as he is shacked up in a remote cabin with a young woman in the snowy wilderness of Sweden.  The happy couple come under attack from gunmen during a morning stroll.  Jack dispatches both of his would-be killers, but now that his girlfriend has learned his true line of work, he is forced to silence her as well.  This scene is quick and brutal, and it ends up taking an emotional toll on Jack, as we soon learn.

He is sent by his contact (Johan Leysen) to lay low in a small village in the Italian countryside, where he is to complete his next assignment:  to assemble an assassin's rifle for a mysterious woman named Mathilde (Thekla Reuten).  Posing as an American photog, he makes the acquaintance of a local priest (Paolo Bonacelli), who suspects what we already knew - that Jack is not all that he seems - and a beautiful prostitute named Clara (Violante Placido), with whom Jack commits the cardinal sin for those in his profession, by developing real feelings for her.  As Jack makes the decision that this latest job will be his last, we already know that it won't be that simple... it never is. 

The cinematography for this film is outstanding.  There are fantastic shots aplenty of the gorgeous Italian landscape, as well as aerial and street views of the quaint, cobblestoned streets of various rustic Italian villages.  The vistas are so beautiful to look at, we almost forget that there is a drama unfolding... almost.  Make no mistake - The American is not your typical "assassin" movie.  Though there are a few minutes of action, it's nothing on the level of, say, the Bourne movies.  The panoramic views come at the expense of any truly meaningful dialogue, and as a result, there is very little character development.  We can see that Clara, the "hooker with a heart of gold" is succeeding in melting the ice around Jack's cold, emotionless, all-business heart, but those signs come too close to the film's climax to really be very satisfying.

Director Anton Corbijn has got a lot of talent as a director, and a lot of promise.  But if we're going to use The American as a yardstick, he's a lot more like Terence Malick than Paul Greengrass.  It's a well-acted, well-shot story, and Clooney does the best he can to make Jack his own, but there's simply not enough STORY to get completely engrossed in.  If more time had been spent on character development and less on the Italian travel brochure, this would have been a much better film.  As it is, however, it is merely okay.

2 1/2 / 5 stars

About Patrick Hodges

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