Robert Hansen is the worst spy in history, in terms of damage done to the United States. This sentence makes Robert Hansen seem like a guy who has an interesting story to tell. And he might, too; unfortunately, "Breach" is the movie they made about his actions instead.
"Breach" tells the story of FBI agent-in-training Eric O'Neill, played by Ryan Phillippe ("Flags of our Fathers," "Crash"), who gets assigned to watch an agent accused of lewd behavior.
This agent is Robert Hansen, played by Chris Cooper ("Syriana," "Jarhead"), and it just so happens that he is a double agent who has been selling secrets to the Russians for years.
The plot sounds like a spy film classic, but somewhere along the way "Breach" manages to make espionage dull. "Breach" is based on a true story, and it shows.
While classic spy thrillers focus on the more extreme aspects of the job, "Breach" focuses more on Hansen's personality than on his misdeeds.
Hansen is a staunch Catholic, and it seems that there are more scenes about Catholicism in the film than those that involve actual espionage. He spouts classic conservative rhetoric about abortion, gay marriage and women in the work force - the whole shebang.
While this sort of thing monopolizes much of the first half of the film, the second half focuses on showing how hollow all of Hansen's beliefs are and how corrupt he really is.
While character development is generally a good aspect of a film, "Breach" goes too far. Far too much time is spent showing the mental strain of working for the FBI instead of the work itself.
The film is shown from O'Neil's perspective, which means that while Hansen might have been doing interesting things, the audience gets to see O'Neil doing things as interesting as taking his boss's PDA and fighting with his wife.
The film not only lacks action but is light on suspense and plot twists as well. All the facts are laid on the table by the middle of the film, and only one scene puts anyone in any real danger. To top it all off, the story has some rather gaping plot holes, such as why an expert spy like Hansen would be able to tell when O'Neil is lying sometimes but conveniently unable to do so with others.
Everything else about the film is strictly milquetoast. Both Phillippe and Cooper give decent, if not outstanding performances, but other than the scenes around the climax they didn't have much to work with.
The cinematography is the same way, not bad in any way, but not particularly good either.
Overall, "Breach" seems like a very realistic representation of the facts surrounding Hansen's work as a double agent. But if this film is any indication of how the whole thing went down, then it is just not movie material.
"Breach" shows that real spy work isn't about Bondesque car chases and nifty gadgets but rather moral ambiguity and bureaucracy. Unfortunately, Bond movies are a lot more interesting to watch.
Reach the reporter at: zachary.richter@asu.edu.
