The Russia House (1990) is an American spy drama, based on the novel of the same name by John le Carré. It was directed by Fred Schepisi, and starred Sean Connery and Michelle Pfeiffer, with Roy Scheider, James Fox and Klaus Maria Brandauer in supporting roles.
It was filmed on location in the Soviet Union, the first American motion picture to do so before the dissolution of the socialist state.[1]
Plot
Bartholomew "Barley" Scott Blair (Sean Connery), the head of a British publishing firm. is on a business trip to Moscow, and attends a writers retreat where he speaks of an inevitable New World Order on its way and an end to tension with the West. Attentively listening is a man called Dante (Klaus Maria Brandauer), who wants to be convinced that Barley means what he says. It transpires that Dante has secretly written a book about the Soviet Union's true nuclear missile capabilities.
Unable to locate Barley at a sales fair, a Russian woman named Katya Orlova (Michelle Pfeiffer) asks Niki Landau (Nicholas Woodeson), another publishing company's representative, to pass along a very important manuscript. Niki sneaks a look at the book and delivers it to British government authorities instead. British intelligence agents and American CIA agents promptly summon Barley and request his help. Their plan is to give him some fundamental training as a spy, before sending him to the USSR in an attempt to arrange a personal meeting with Dante, a brilliant scientist whose actual name is Yakov. Barley reluctantly agrees and is briefed by Ned (James Fox), his British contact. Ned's counterpart in the United States, Russell (Roy Scheider), ultimately comes to London to monitor Barley's progress.
Barley travels to Moscow, and upon meeting Katya is instantly smitten. She is likewise taken with him, but having been taught to be suspicious, asks Barley outright if he is a spy, to which he replies "no."
When he finally meets with Dante/Yakov face to face, Barley explains that the sensitive manuscript is now in the hands of British and American authorities. Yakov feels betrayed, but Barley convinces him that the book can still be published, which was the author's objective in the first place. Barley and Katya fear that they, and particularly Yakov, could be under KGB observation. A series of questions is designed to verify the facts presented in the book, but Yakov vanishes and is said to be gravely ill. Allowed a phone call, he uses a code word to let Katya know that he has been captured, and that her life is also in danger.
Now in love with Katya, Barley confesses the truth and hatches a plan to help her and her family escape. Barley enters a building and never comes out, much to the consternation of British and American authorities. He has traded the list of questions to the Russians in exchange for the freedom of Katya's family. He admits to the British and Americans that it might be unfair, but as he writes to Ned: "That's what you get for opening other people's mail."
Barley waits in Lisbon for a ship to dock that brings Katya and her family to begin a new life with him.
Cast
Production
The Russia House was filmed on location in Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia,[2] the first major American production to be filmed substantially in the former Soviet Union.[1]
Reception
The Russia House currently holds a score of 69% on Rotten Tomatoes,[3] indicating a generally positive critical reception.
Hal Hinson in the Washington Post wrote: "Making a picture about the political situation in a country as much in flux as the Soviet Union can be disastrous, but the post-glasnost realities here seem plausible and up to the minute. The Russia House doesn't sweep you off your feet; it works more insidiously than that, flying in under your radar. If it is like any of its characters, it's like Katya. It's reserved, careful to declare itself but full of potent surprises. It's one of the year's best films."[4] Peter Travers in Rolling Stone wrote: "At its best, The Russia House offers a rare and enthralling spectacle: the resurrection of buried hopes."[5] Time Out less enthusiastically wrote: "Overtaken by East-West events, and with an over-optimistic ending which sets personal against political loyalty, it's still highly enjoyable, wittily written, and beautiful to behold in places, at others somehow too glossy for its own good."[6]
Tom Stoppard's adapted screenplay was criticised by Vincent Canby in the New York Times: "There is evidence of Mr. Stoppard's wit in the dialogue, but the lines are not easily spoken, which is not to say that they are unspeakable. They are clumsy."[7] Roger Ebert held a similar view in the Chicago Sun-Times: "What's good are the few emotional moments that break out of the weary spy formula: Connery declaring his love for Pfeiffer, or the British and Americans getting on each other's nerves. But these flashes of energy are isolated inside a screenplay that is static and boring, that drones on lifelessly through the le Carré universe, like some kind of space probe that continues to send back random information long after its mission has been accomplished."[8]
Sean Connery was praised for his portrayal of Barley, "bluff, incorrigible, jazz-loving... his finest performance in ages."[6] Variety wrote: "As the flawed, unreliable publisher, Connery is in top form."[1] Peter Travers in Rolling Stone thought he captured "the 'splendid quiet' that le Carré found in Blair."[5] Hal Hinson in the Washington Post wrote: "This may be the most complex character Connery has ever played, and without question it's one of his richest performances. Connery shows the melancholy behind Barley's pickled charm, all the wasted years and unkept promises."[4] Desson Howe, also in the Washington Post, wrote: "Sean Connery, like Anthony Quinn, takes a role like a vitamin pill, downs it, then goes about his bighearted business of making the part his idiosyncratic own."[9] However, he received criticism from the New York Times, who thought that the "usually magnetic Mr. Connery... is at odds with Barley, a glib, lazy sort of man who discovers himself during this adventure. Mr. Connery goes through the movie as if driving in second gear."[7]
Michelle Pfeiffer also garnered critical plaudits for delivering "the film's most persuasive performance... Miss Pfeiffer, sporting a credible Russian accent, brings to it a no-nonsense urgency that is missing from the rest of the movie,"[7] according to the New York Times. Desson Howe in the Washington Post wrote: "As Katya, a mother who risks her love to smuggle a document and falls for a Westerner in the process, her gestures are entirely believable, her accent (at least to one set of Western ears) is quietly perfect."[9] Peter Travers in Rolling Stone wrote that "Pfeiffer, who gets more subtle and incisive with each film, is incandescent as Katya."[5] Hal Hinson in the Washington Post congratulated her for portraying a rounded character: "Her triumph goes beyond her facility with the Russian accent; other actresses could have done that. She's great at playing contradictions, at being tough yet yielding, cloaked yet open, direct yet oblique. What's she's playing, we suspect, is the great Russian game of hide-and-seek. But Pfeiffer gives it a personal dimension. Katya holds herself in check, but her wariness, one senses, is as much personal as it is cultural -- the result, perhaps, of her own secret wounds. It's one of the year's most full-blooded performances."[4] However, Pfeiffer also had her detractors. Variety thought that her "Russian accent proves very believable but she has limited notes to play."[1] Time Out wrote that "Pfeiffer can act, but her assumption of a role for which her pouty glamour is inappropriate - a Russian office-worker seen rubbing shoulders in the bus queues - is a jarring note."[6]
Awards and nominations
Fred Schepisi was nominated for the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival.[10]
Michelle Pfeiffer was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Drama, but lost to Kathy Bates in Misery (1990).[10]
External links
The Russia House at the Internet Movie Database
References
- ^ a b c d "The Russia House Review". variety.com. http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117794615.html?categoryid=31&cs=1. Retrieved 2009-11-17.
- ^ "The Russia House (1990) - Filming locations". imdb.com. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100530/locations. Retrieved 2009-11-16.
- ^ "The Russia House Movie Reviews, Pictures - Rotten Tomatoes". rottentomatoes.com. http://uk.rottentomatoes.com/m/russia_house/. Retrieved 2009-11-17.
- ^ a b c Hinson, Hal (December 21, 1990). "'The Russia House' (R)". washingtonpost.com. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/movies/videos/therussiahouserhinson_a0a9c2.htm.
- ^ a b c Travers, Peter (January 10, 1991). "The Russia House : Review : Rolling Stone". rollingstone.com. http://www.rollingstone.com/reviews/movie/5948933/review/5948934/the_russia_house.
- ^ a b c "The Russia House Review - Film - Time Out London". timeout.com. http://www.timeout.com/film/reviews/77045/the_russia_house.html. Retrieved 2009-11-17.
- ^ a b c Canby, Vincent (December 19, 1990). "Movie Review - The Russia House". movies.nytimes.com. http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9C0CE6DC1F39F93AA25751C1A966958260&partner=Rotten%20Tomatoes.
- ^ Ebert, Roger (December 21, 1990). "The Russia House :: rogerebert.com". rogerebert.suntimes.com. http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19901221/REVIEWS/12210303/1023.
- ^ a b Howe, Desson (December 21, 1990). "'The Russia House' (R)". washingtonpost.com. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/movies/videos/therussiahouserhowe_a0b2c7.htm.
- ^ a b "The Russia House (1990) - Awards". imdb.com. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100530/awards. Retrieved 2009-11-16.
