You want style? Welcome to art-house thriller The American. Espressos, shades, bespoke weapons, cashmere dresses, perfect mountains, perfect breasts But what shall it profit a man (in this case restless Hollywood thesp George Clooney) if he becomes synonymous with sleekness but loses his soul?
The American is based on a 1990 novel by the British author Martin Booth. As reworked by Rowan Joffe, it’s pulp without friction. As soon as you meet weapons expert Jack (Clooney), you know he’s a lone wolf in a forest of lies. As soon as you meet his boss, Pavel (Johan Leysen), his brittle colleague Mathilde (Thekla Reuten), the vivacious prostitute Clara (Violante Placido) and the kindly priest (Paolo Bonacelli) you can tell how they’re going to slot in. In search of redemption, Jack has to lie low in a village in Abruzzo and complete a risk-free assignment. Can he escape his violent past? Is Pope Benedict
a Jew?
One of the most annoying things about the film is its smugness. We’re asked to find this rural Italian setting charming but also backward. The waiters, for example, can’t believe that Clara knows how to order wine. Ha, ha! They’re living in a time warp! Jack, by contrast, is so confident about his old-school masculinity that he’s happy to let her take control. The Coen brothers have in the past used Clooney as a model for the timelessly suave alpha male, but they do so with tongue in cheek. The American has no such distance.
Director Anton Corbijn has only made one other film, the low-budget Joy Division biopic, Control. Perhaps he was so grateful to have Clooney on board that he felt reverence was the only option.
Ignore talk that Clooney deserves an Oscar for this "against type" performance — there’s not a single panicked glare that doesn’t feel overworked (I believed in Jack’s sexiness and boredom, not his guilt or terror). The editing is also awkward — a crucial scene with Clara creates the wrong kind of jolt.
As for the anguished ending (which involves an "endangered butterfly"), it’s so portentous and sentimental you’ll be tempted to giggle. We should invent a term for so-called mood pieces like The American. GBD: grim but dim.
The American
Cert: 15
