It should be impossible for a film to be both a disappointment and a pleasant surprise, but Anton Corbijn’s anti-thriller The American comes pretty damn close. The disappointment comes from the fact that the picture is Corbijn’s less-than-brilliant follow-up to his 2007 Ian Curtis and Joy Division biopic Control – one of the truly outstanding British films of the current decade.
Critical responses to The American, adapted by Rowan Joffe from Martin Booth’s 1990 novel A Very Private Gentleman have ranged from mixed to hostile – serving to lower expectations. However, while it has more than its share of flaws, including several plausibility-stretching plot developments at crucial stages, The American proves to be rather more watchable and satisfying than early reviews might have led one to expect. If nothing else, it provides George Clooney with an unusual, challenging role that’s a break from anything he has done before on screen. As Jack, a monosyllabic, ageing armourer who provides custom-built guns for high-paying customers on a strict
no-questions-asked basis, he betrays no hint of a smile over the course of the picture’s
105 minutes, making his supposedly world-weary Oscar-nominated turns in Michael Clayton and Up In the Air look distinctly cheery in comparison.
And, in what’s effectively an old-fashioned star vehicle, Clooney is on screen for the vast bulk of that time as a former Special Forces operative who, fleeing Swedish assassins, hides out in a remote Italian town. Completing one last job for an enigmatic client (Thekla Reuten), Jack – somewhat ill-advisedly, given the circumstances – falls in love with a beautiful sex-worker (Violante Placido).
The American doesn’t exactly fight shy of storytelling clichés: Jack develops a father-son relationship with an elderly priest (Paolo Bonacelli) over the course of several existential conversations. Despite the seclusion of his chosen locale, nearly everyone in the area seems to speak surprisingly good English.
So long as you don’t expect the kind of high-octane, mainstream action-picture promised by the picture’s promotional material, The American yields its share of pleasures. Slow-burning, stripped down character-based and cagey to the point of evasiveness, the picture represents the latest respectful homage to Jean-Pierre Melville’s enduringly influential Le Samouraï – albeit a less effective one than Thomas Arslan’s In the Shadows, currently doing the festival circuit to near-universal acclaim but so far, like so many fine German movies, without much hope of British distribution.
