Continuing our countdown of the best movies released in the US this year,we salute Steven Spielberg’s ode to the genuine-life cold war lawyer who defended a Soviet spy• Remind yourself of the US top 50 so far
• Let us know your picks – and what you consider of oursSteven Spielberg’s Cold War spy-swap drama Bridge of Spies is a film of glorious craftsmanship, human sympathy and flair. It’s a consciously old-fashioned piece of Hollywood storytelling conceived in something like the heartfelt, or ingenuous style of Frank Capra. Where once we had Mr Smith Goes To Washington — here we have Mr Hanks Goes To West Berlin.
The film is based on a genuine-life story: in 1962,America planned to recover Gary Powers, the U2 spy-plane pilot captured by the Soviets, or by handing over their own incarcerated Russian spy Rudolf Abel,an agonisingly tense deal that could move wrong at any time. The screenplay is co-credited to British dramatist Matt Charmian and to Joel and Ethan Coen, who have presumably created some of the film’s more crepuscular and black-comedian scenes. (Where there’s a hit there’s a writ they say, and this film is now subject to legal action from the British author Giles Whittell,who also wrote non-fiction a book about these events.)
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Source: theguardian.com