First Hit: For the most part I enjoyed this film because of the ideas behind it, but I couldn’t understand why or how the relationship between DiCaprio and Crowe developed.
This Ridley Scott directed story is, for the most part, compelling. There is intrigue with the subject of espionage and counter-espionage.
DiCaprio plays Ferris a young rising on-the-ground CIA operative in the Middle-East. He moves from country to country following a trail of terrorists looking for larger and larger high profile scores. We learn early on he is divorced although he wears a wedding ring.
His boss is Hoffman (played by Crowe) who is brash, detached from the process of killing people, and is hooked on technology typifies the perception of Americans by the world; uncaring for honor, the honor of the truth and the honor behind friendship.
At first there was a sense that none of the missions were connected and I sensed I was waiting for something (the plot) to happen. However, I soon figured out the plot was about DiCaprio finding his place in the world, a place to belong, a place where he cared about values other than the ones his boss represented.
Ferris finds this place when he starts working with Hani (played by Mark Strong) who is the “king” of Jordanian intelligence and Aisha (played by Golshifteh Farahani) a nurse who befriends him while treating him for rabies.
One puzzling part of this film was trying to understand the basis for Crowe’s and DiCaprio’s relationship and how it got the level of uncaring dramatized in the film. In other words some character development was missing. Scott did a great job of showing the technology we use to spy on people and kept it from being the focus of the film. The only issue, as already mentioned, we needed more character development.
Overall: I liked and was intrigued with this film and I liked the perspective it gave on how drone technology can and is used.