In
1986, Soviet Refusenik Natan Sharansky gained his freedom through the final
Cold War exchange conducted on Berlin’s Glienicke Bridge. Brooklyn attorney James
B. Donovan found himself negotiating the first. At trial, he had represented
convicted Soviet spy Col. Vilyam Fisher, a.k.a. Rudolf Abel, a British born KGB
agent, who had narrowly escaped Stalin’s purges during his time with the NKVD. Presumably,
the Russians will want him back, just as America wants Francis Gary Powers
safely returned. To negotiate the deal in his unofficial capacity, Donovan navigates
the murky political waters of Berlin during the final days of the construction
of the Wall in Steven Spielberg’s Bridge
of Spies (trailer
here),
which screens as a Main Slate selection of the 53rd New York Film Festival.
Donovan
the kind of stickler lawyer you do not want to be haggling with. Since he was also
a junior member of the Nuremberg prosecution team, the Brooklyn Bar helpfully
nominates him as Abel’s attorney. Although not thrilled, Donovan does his duty
more diligently than anyone anticipates. Nevertheless, Abel is convicted, but conveniently
not sentenced to death.
Sometime
after U-2 pilot Powers’ capture and show trial, Donovan receives a strange
overture from East Germany. With the CIA’s blessing but no official portfolio,
Donovan tries to negotiate an Abel-for-Powers deal, but it is complicated by
the arrest of American economics student Frederic Pryor on transparently bogus
espionage charges. Suddenly the dodgy Wolfgang Vogel representing the GDR wants
to swap Pryor for Abel, while the Berlin KGB station chief is willing to deal
Powers for Abel.
While
there is a bit of le Carré equivalency baked into screenwriters Matt Charman
and Joel & Ethan Cohen’s depiction of the respective intelligence agencies,
there is no denying the oppressive bleakness of East Berlin. Production
designer Adam Stockhausen’s team vividly recreates the rubble strewn streets,
bombed out blocks, and ominously imposing Berlin Wall. To his credit, Spielberg
also shows exactly what happened to those who tried to scale it.
Of
course, Donovan is exactly the sort of exceptional everyman that has become
Hanks’ specialty. While he brings an instant credibility and a certain comfort
level to the character, he never delivers any surprises—only sniffles as
Donovan endures an awful cold. On the other hand, Mark Rylance is weirdly
mesmerizing as the off-center Abel, precisely because of his restraint. It is
like his face is a Rorschach test, which you cannot stop staring at.
For
traditional villainy, Sebastian Koch chews plenty of scenery as Vogel, but he
gets somewhat shortchanged on screen time. However, nobody is as embarrassingly
unnecessary as Amy Ryan, playing an underwritten Mary Donovan, whose sole
function in the film is to hassle her husband to bring back Harrods marmalade
from his supposed fishing trip to Scotland.
