From there, “Black Bag” follows George as he follows Kathryn’s whereabouts, remotely, as she conducts what seems to be a routine project in Switzerland. He’s doing double responsibility, maintaining a tally of her security in addition to her potential culpability. And in Fassbender and Blanchett, director Soderbergh advantages from a selection pair of sphinxes.
Unfolding over a couple of days, the cat-and-mouse intrigue of “Black Bag” sustains a dense however adroit comedy of office manners. It’s additionally a efficiency lesson within the artwork of the conceal, versus the reveal, and Koepp takes care to delineate everybody’s smarts in numerous methods. A standout scene, as written, filmed and acted, pits psychiatrist Zoe towards agent James, with Harris, enmeshed professionally and personally, matching wits with Web page in each terse trade.
Taking pictures digitally — Soderbergh was an early digital convert, and as soon as once more serves as his personal cinematographer and editor — the director favors a barely queasy medical high quality in his lighting when a scene’s uneasiness requires it. Within the psychiatric analysis sequence, the sunshine exterior Zoe’s workplace window makes it a bit laborious, on function, to completely discern the faces within the foreground two-way interrogation. We squint a little bit, watching two characters narrowing their very own eyes, questioning in the event that they’re listening to something near the reality.
There are occasions in “Black Bag,” its title invoked every time any person can’t or received’t discuss one thing as a result of it’s confidential, when Fassbender’s restraint feels rote, verging on not-entirely-human. (You wouldn’t be shocked if George turned out to be the android Fassbender performed in his two “Alien” motion pictures.) As at all times, the actor’s work holds the display, in its exact and unblinking focus. On the similar time he’s giving what may be referred to as a turtleneck efficiency; within the position of an emotional cipher, however a hunky one, Fassbender has a means of letting the garments, on this case a dashing turtleneck sweater, do the heavy lifting.
