Review of Body of Lies (2008) by Alec M — 31 Jul 2011

I was really looking forward to Body of Lies. Leonardo DiCaprio and screenwriter William Monahan are teaming up with director Ridley Scott. DiCaprio and Monahan were fresh off there success with The Departed.

An outstanding movie. So I had reason to be excited. Ridley Scott is a great directer, this guy has brought us great movies like Gladiator, American Gangster, and Blade Runner. So we expect a lot from him.

This is not one of his masterpiece's like American Gangster, but that does not stop it from being a good movie. Body of Lies is based on a 2007 novel by Washington Post foreign affairs columnist David Ignatius.

Leonardo DiCaprio plays Roger Ferris, a CIA operative who is neck deep in double crosses and conspiracies as he negotiates in earnest with defected terrorists for information in the Middle East. His boss, Ed Hoffman (Russell Crowe), hands down orders and advice to him via telephone but is comfortably stationed thousands of miles away in a life of routine and domesticity.

ED will do anything to accomplish his goal, no matter who he uses to do it. Roger then brokers a tenuous deal with a Jordanian security officer named Hani (Mark Strong) in order to pursue an up and coming terrorist who is poised to becoming the next Osama Bin Laden.

But when Ed decides to press another separate team into service to accelerate the pursuit, Roger finds himself caught between his boss and Hani, who is as feared as much as he is respected. Hani had only one rule if they were going to work together, it was to never lie to him.

Soon, Roger discovers that it's not only his enemies that he must fear, but also his allies, he doesn't know who to rust anymore. As Hoffman and Hani's race to apprehend the same criminal not only escalates tensions between America and Jordan, but endangers his life and that of a young nurse named Aisha (Golshifteh Farahani) with whom he has fallen in love with.

The acting was very good, DiCaprio gives another good believable performance. Russell Crowe is also great, he gained 50 pounds to play this guy. Crowe's performance can be both very funny and very mean.

The standout performance though is from Mark Strong, he is just outstanding. Monohan 's script is good, it's not great. Monohan knows how to write a good script, he can apply a good amount of intelligence to a script, that could have otherwise been just pure entertainment.

I like how he dug deep into the strategies that governing bodies apply to their peacekeeping. The one thing that I didn't like was the little love story he put in. We didn't need the subplot that involved Roger falling for a nurse (Golshifteh Farahani).

It wasn't handled that well and didn't really belong in this kind of a movie, that was the main issue I had with Monohan's script. Yes this movie has some flaws, but if you pay attention you will see a smart movie about spies.