Duplicity

MI6 or CIA, what’s your poison? A Brit and Yank go head to head in a corporate battle to come out on top. The CIA’s ex-secret weapon comes in the form of Claire Stenwick (Roberts): seductive, sassy and skilful. Slick ex-MI6 charmer, Ray Koval (Owen), must avoid the temptress to succeed in his goal of securing the patent of an extremely valuable formula for his company. But there’s more to it than that. An obvious history exists but is it more than just their hidden attraction for one another?

Acclaimed as ‘a more sophisticated Ocean’s Eleven’, this film has got it all: romance, action, comedy and even some light-hearted politics. Writer and director Tony Gilroy (the writer of the Bourne movies), is truly a genius when it comes to plots filled with twists and the unexpected. Information about the characters’ past is tantalisingly dangled before us and every now and then we get a taste, leaving us viewers desperate for more right until the climatic final sequence.

The casting director should be given a medal for the recruitment of Julia Roberts and Clive Owen for their respective roles. Their chemistry was already well-established in the award-winning film Closer, and clearly is not lost in this film. This is what makes the rivalry and double-crossing even more captivating. Their paranoia is shared with audiences, played so well that we don’t know which one to trust.

A must-see is an understatement. This clever piece of cinema will have your heart racing in more ways than one.

Samilia Ekeocha