Film
What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases
Bookmark this pageThe Recruit (2003)
Director: Roger Donaldson
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
'Trust no one!' confides grizzled senior CIA instructor Walter Burke (Pacino) to favoured new recruit, computer whiz and surrogate son James Clayton (Farrell) at the Langley farm. That goes for Donaldson too, a skilful negotiator of the crooked corridors of the political thriller. Here, however, he comes dangerously close to turning out a Tony Scott movie: Top Gun for spooks. Not only is MIT graduate Clayton as flash and fast hacking at a Mac keyboard as Maverick was at the controls of an F14 Tomcat, he goes through the same predictably torturous graduation. Will he get to join the ranks of his country's underpaid secret heroes? True, Donaldson doesn't quite turn the film into a Company PR exercise, despite the dreadful speechifying. The so-called 'tests' are too risible for that. But he does struggle with the competing twists and turns of the multi-handed script. Farrell and Pacino ensure the first half is fully entertaining. But thereafter the movie descends disappointingly into a morass of double cross, disguise, death and deceit as the games become a deadly 'real' race to save the world from a power-disabling electronic virus.Author: WH
Cast & crew
Director: Roger Donaldson
Producer: Roger Birnbaum, Jeff Apple, Gary Barber
Cast: Al Pacino, Colin Farrell, Bridget Moynahan, Gabriel Macht, Karl Pruner, Mike Realba, Dom Fiore, Ron Lea, Jeanie Calleja full cast
Genre(s): Thrillers
Duration: 115 mins
Most popular on this site
Top Stories
Has David Cronenberg turned tame?
Has director David Cronenberg veered too far from his radical and bloody roots with new film 'A Dangerous Method'?
The 10 worst date movies
Just in time for Valentine's Day, we present ten of the least romantic films ever made
Where to watch this year's Oscar-nominated films
Find out where to watch 2012's Oscar-nominated films in London cinemas
10 unlikely badboy biopics
Featuring Phil Collins, Jeremy Clarkson, Nick Clegg, David Starkey and a host of other unlikely subjects
Interview: Sean Durkin on 'Martha Marcy May Marlene'
The first-time director of the brilliant new thriller discusses religious cults and robot boxing
Pop-up cinema for Valentine's Day
Side-step romantic clichés with some alternative Valentine’s viewing
What do you think?
Post your review now