The spy thriller Kompromat is a harrowing tale.
Mathieu Roussel (Gilles Lellouche) has accepted a role as the director of French language institute Alliance Francaise in Russia. With his wife Alice (Elisa Lasowski) and their young daughter Rose (Olivia Malahieude), Mathieu has move from France to take up his new role. A caring and considerate father, his marriage is on shaky ground after Alice cheated on him. But nothing can prepare him for what’s about to happen.
One night, without warning, the Russian secret police barge into his home and forcefully take him and Rose away. He’s thrown into jail on trumped-up charges of disseminating child pornography and molesting his daughter. That starts an ordeal that includes being bashed and escaping with the help of Svetlana (Joanna Kulig), the daughter-in-law of a high-ranking Russian agent. Mathieu’s die is cast due to his liberal attitude to the arts and not reading the fact that Russians view things differently to the French.
The word Kompromat comes from a Russian KGB slang term for “compromising material”. Kompromat, the movie, is loosely based on fact. It was freely inspired by the true story of what happened to a Frenchman living in Russia. The film drips with tension and intrigue. This is one of the better recent examples of the spy genre thanks to the compelling writing of Cary Ferey and director Jerome Salle. I liked the narrative arc they gave to Svetlana – a woman all too aware of the tactics employed by the secret police. While Mathieu is far more open and effusive, Svetlana keeps her cards close to her chest. In spite of that, she is determined to do all she can to help and risks her own safely more than once by so doing. She has a love/hate relationship with her physically and psychologically scarred husband, Sasha Rostov (Daniil Vorobyov), a victim of the war in Chechnya.
Lellouche is agreeable in the lead as a decent guy caught up in a horrible situation. He channels a naïve, everyday man who develops smarts while going through the ordeal that he does. Playing mercenary characters are Michael Gor as Rostov’s father, a federal security agent who Svetlana detests, and Igor Jijikine as enforcer Sagarine. They are thoroughly unlikeable types who have no “off” buttons.
So the film captures the jackboot mentality of the Russians in continuing to push to bring Mathieu down. Even though it pushes through the two-hour mark, I found the time passed quickly. Kompromat is engaging fare.
Alex First
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Alex First is a Melbourne based journalist and communications specialist. He contributes to The Blurb on film and theatre.