Black Bag

When his beloved wife, Kathryn, is suspected of betraying King and country, intelligence agent George Woodhouse faces the ultimate test... loyalty to his marriage or loyalty to his nation.

I’m always interested in the new Steven Soderbergh film. Out of Sight, Logan Lucky, No Sudden Moves, Kimi, on and on. He makes some of my favorite films. What’s really nice about them is, while it’s fair to call them all “crime dramas” or maybe “adult thrillers,” they are also firmly rooted in their respective genres. Each one has a style that is different from the rest. That’s what I like about Soderbergh, you can generally expect a quality film, but as to exactly what kind of quality film, you’ll just have to watch and see.

And so, here we are with Black Bag.

George Woodhouse is a legendary officer with MI6, the British Secret Intelligence Service, well-known for his skills at surveillance, investigation, and deduction.

George’s current mission: Investigate the leak of a top-secret software program, code-named Severus. He asks for two weeks, but after being reminded that should Severus get out, untold numbers of innocents could die, he acquiesces and accepts a deadline of a week. Soon enough, George has a short list of suspects. In an effort to smoke the guilty party out, George invites those suspects to a small dinner party at his house.

The short list include…

Freddie Smalls, a subordinate SIS officer who George recently passed over for a promotion because of his substance abuse issues. Clarissa Dubose, a manipulative young ingenue and satellite imagery specialist who is still relatively new to MI6, and Freddie’s much younger date. Colonel James Stokes, an up-and-coming SIS officer, and the person George ended up giving the recent promotion to. And Dr. Zoe Vaughan, an SIS therapist who regularly evaluates their psychological fitness, who is also James’ date. The fifth and final suspect is Kathryn, George’s wife, an SIS intelligence officer who is possibly more skilled at her job than George is.

Before the guests arrive for the evening, George warns Kathryn to avoid the chana masala, as in an effort to loosen everyone’s tongues and lower their inhibitions, he has dosed it with a drug called DZM 5. Once the guests are seated, George suggests a ”fun” dinner party game under the guise of everyone getting to know each other better, and the secrets begin to spill…

So, with the game afoot, George only has a few days to uncover the responsible party before the mysterious program known as Severus can begin to wreak real-world havoc. Unfortunately for George… all of the evidence seems to indicate that Kathryn is that responsible party.

Black Bag is a fun, smart, and sexy spy thriller/marriage drama. Set over the course of a single week, in the most current era of our evergoing Cold War, it is simultaneously about potentially world-ending threats, and also about keeping up with the Joneses.

It’s a deceptively garrulous story that can often feel more like an Agatha Christie mystery, or even a screwball comedy, with its quick patter dialogue, than it does a more expected Jason Bourne type of espionage drama. But at the same time, it also has those elements too. This all means it’s an excellent adult drama, an espionage caper that not only has the typical ticking clock of a MacGuffin, as well as a twisty-turny mystery, it also uses these situations to examine how a person would be able to maintain trust in their relationship when their careers require almost absolute secrecy. Black Bag is a very classic kind of Hollywood star vehicle, showcasing two great actors with incredible chemistry, at the lead of an excellent cast, all of whom play perfectly off one another.

Of course, with the way out world is now, both in cultural and political terms, but also due to the reality of a world where COVID is still a thing, Black Bag had a $50 million dollar budget, but only made about 41 million worldwide. So, despite being a truly excellent film, this unfortunately means that it’s a huge failure, at least as far as Hollywood is concerned.

This somewhat understandably frustrated Soderbergh, who said:

"This is the kind of film I made my career on. And if a mid-level budget, star-driven movie can't seem to get people over the age of 25 years old to come out to theatres – if that's truly a dead zone – then that's not a good thing for movies. What's gonna happen to the person behind me who wants to make this kind of film?”

It really is too bad. But also, I think this is just the way things are now. Pandora’s Box has been opened and it can’t be closed again. Between the realities of COVID, and this country’s unwillingness to deal with that reality—because it requires them to prioritize something over their own money and comfort—as well as the fact that most of the larger theatre chains have no interest in improving their services in any way, which means most movie theatres are always absolutely filthy, and the tickets and snacks are too expensive, which is made all the worse when the presentation of the film is subpar, and the general audience is disruptive and rude, not to mention combative if they’re asked to be considerate of others, and the movie theatre staff certainly isn’t paid enough to have to deal with that shit, so the whole thing is just a terrible experience far too often. Why would anyone want to pay that much for so little, especially when it’s a movie that requires a little bit of intelligence, and also a willingness to be quiet and to listen?

These days, the simple truth is, it’s just better to watch most films at home. And maybe that’s too bad when it comes to the theatrical experience, but maybe this is just yet another facet of American culture that is now long gone, destroyed by the rotten reality of American culture, and that’s something we just have to accept and adjust to. I don’t know what the answer is moving ahead, I just don’t think we’re going to find it by looking backwards.

But all that shit aside…

This is a good movie. A nice little adult thriller. It’s one of my favorites of the year, and definitely worth checking out.