The International (2009)

The International gives corruption an immaculate setting. Glass, stone and carefully ordered interiors surround people conducting ugly business. The buildings suggest permanence; the people trying to challenge the system look temporary.

Tom Tykwer’s thriller follows Interpol agent Louis Salinger and Manhattan prosecutor Eleanor Whitman, played by Clive Owen and Naomi Watts, into a conspiracy of banking, arms dealing and murder. It is a promising combination of professions and competing jurisdictions. The film is less successful at making those complications feel urgent.

A world behind glass

Owen supplies the necessary fatigue and determination. Salinger seems to have spent too long following connections that lead beyond his reach. Around him, the elegant locations reinforce the impression of a world designed to keep its occupants protected.

The difficulty is dramatic. Explanations accumulate more readily than discoveries that change our relationship to the characters. The conspiracy grows, but its size often substitutes for tension. Watts gives the investigation a second perspective without receiving enough room to make that partnership the centre of the film.

When the space breaks open

The Guggenheim shootout changes the register. The museum’s curves and open sightlines become immediate problems of movement and exposure. A setting that could have remained an elegant backdrop starts determining the action.

It is the film’s clearest demonstration of what its visual intelligence can do. Elsewhere, that intelligence tends to observe power from a distance. Here, the geometry has consequences.

The wider story returns to a bleaker idea: removing an individual may do little to interrupt an institution. That is a strong premise for a thriller, but the film reaches it with less force than its architecture promises. The International is worth revisiting for the way it looks at space. Its political unease never quite becomes equally compelling drama.