Farewell

Director: Christian Carion
Cast: Emir Kusturica, Guillaume Canet, Fred Ward and Willem Dafoe
Releasing in cinemas: 1 July 2010
Rated: M

A convincing spy thriller with character development and plot detail unusually good (in keeping with The Lives of Others), Farewell lifts the bar well above average for this genre. Finely crafted with a touch of Eisenstein, the great Russian director of the 30s, the meaningfully edited symbolic images give added depth. Classical crisp cinematography and editing feature right from the first shots, without the visual diarrhea too often seen trying to spark up contemporary thrillers. A neat example of lighting and camerawork in Farewell is the clever reveal of a man’s face in the rear of a car.

We’re far removed from slick James Bond territory of fast autos and deadly babes in this gritty view of real life espionage. In April 1983, French President Mitterrand expelled more than forty Soviet Intelligence Officers, as a direct result of the Farewell Affair, one of the most confounding true espionage stories of the Cold War era. A single Russian source, KGB officer Vladimir Veltrov, supplied lists of Soviet agents working in France, the USA and Western countries, as well as information the Soviets had gathered on Allied arms development. Reflecting the malaise afflicting the Soviet Union in the early 80s, the information allowed President Reagan of the United States to take the initiative and bluff the Soviets with his Star Wars plan; finally leading to the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the demise of Soviet Communist regime.

Farewell is a fictionalized version of these events, basically a study in depth of the odd relationship of the master spy KGB Colonel Sergei Grigoriev (Emir Kusturica) and his uncomfortable go-between young engineer Pierre Froment (Guillaume Canet) who passes on the secret material to the West. Both men realise they’re putting their families in jeopardy with this high risk undertaking. These unlikely conspirators slowly develop mutual respect and a friendship based on their love of French culture. Grigoriev finds the existing Communist system a vast disappointment which provokes his passing over the secret documents (including the ‘X Files’ - no relation to Mulder).

The story expands politically to include President Mitterrand (Philippe Magnan) his interaction with mistrustful President Reagan (Fred Ward) and the CIA chief Feeny (Willem Dafoe). The final shot of the film does a complete circle to the beginning in a powerful conclusion.

That grey feeling of suspicion and suppression during the Cold War is as clearly conveyed as in The Lives of Others, but on a broader palette in this case. Director Christian Carion (Merry Christmas) shows the unvarnished reality of being a spy in much the same way as cinema audiences were introduced by Richard Burton nearly 50 years ago in The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. Carion sets a steady but intriguing pace as the characters develop their relationship and the bigger picture becomes clear.

Emir Kusturica (The Good Thief), a great shaggy bear of man, is effective as the passionate Soviet informer and a terrific match with the somewhat geekish Guillaume Canet (Tell No One). Kusturica himself is a director of films such as Time of the Gypsies. Fred Ward provides a lighter view of President Reagan, even with a clip from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance used as ironic comment. Yet overall the treatment of the movie remains a studious dissection of the relationship between the two protagonists. Certainly it’s not devoid of tension, as evidenced by the nail biting border crossing, and the KGB interrogations. Farewell is an engrossing production with much to recommend.

John Bale