Shadow Dancer
(UK/Ireland, 101 min.)
Dir. James Marsh, Writ. Tom Bradby
Starring: Andrea Riseborough, Clive Owen, Gillian Anderson,
Brid Brennan, Aidan Gillen, Domnhall Gleeson.
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Andrea Riseborough in Shadow Dancer, a Magnolia Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures. |
Andrea Riseborough deserves to be a star. The English
actress is making some headway on this side of the pond after appearing in this
summer’s Tom Cruise pic Oblivion. Likewise, her performance as Wallis
Simpson in last year’s W.E. might
have gone places had the film itself not been such a train wreck; however, Riseborough’s
engrossing performance in W.E. is all
the more impressive if one considers that it was created under the direction of
Madonna. Silly quips aside, Riseborough has serious acting chops. They’re on
full display in James Marsh’s Shadow
Dancer. Riseborough gives a knockout performance that’s worth seeking out.
Riseborough stars as Collette, a young woman living in
Belfast in 1993. A single mother and an active member of the Irish Republican
Army (IRA), Collette wears different guises and bears various loyalties as she
participates in radical acts that could create a better future for her son.
Collette carries a conscientiousness different from that of her hardliner IRA
brothers, played by Aidan Gillen and Anna
Karenina’s Domnhall Gleeson. Having lost her younger brother to violence as
a girl—Collette was supposed to run to the store, but she sent him on the
ill-fated errand instead—Collette is fully aware that the actions she takes can
make victims out of apolitical innocents who were simply in the wrong place at
the wrong time.
Collette’s conflict is worn well on Riseborough’s expressive
malleable face as she rides the London tube, carrying a large bag and observing
the faces of her fellow passengers, en route to her text mission. She gets off
at the next station, waits on the platform—it almost looks as if she’s going to
jump—and then drops her bag and saunters to the exit.
She’s picked up by MI5 as she leaves the station. Mac (Clive
Owen, equally good), the agent handling her investigation, appeals to the mother in Collette
and offers her a deal if she becomes an informant. The bomb she dropped in the
tube station wasn’t even set, Mac observes, so the aborted mission suggests
that this patient suspect will eventually give in.
She does. Collette agrees to work with MI5 and she returns
to the troubles of Belfast to snitch on the IRA. The problem, it seems, is that
someone else is spying on her, too.
The thrill of Shadow
Dancer is watching Riseborough navigate the psychological turmoil in which
Collette finds herself. She can’t trust anyone, even her own family, and any
wrong move could leave her in a ditch. Collette can’t turn to her mother (played
by a strong Brid Brennan), either, since Ma isn’t afraid to judge her daughter’s
radicalism and she insists Collette should stay home with her son instead of
joining the rest of the family on hits. Collette’s only alley is her enemy, Mac
the Londoner. Collette’s life rests in Mac’s ability to protect her. Mac, on
the other hand, learns that his boss, Kate (a sturdy Gillian Anderson), is
ready to let Collette bite the bullet so that she can follow other leads.
Marsh and screenwriter Tom Bradby, adapting his own novel,
keep the espionage character-driven and intimate. Shadow Dancer is an old-school spy thriller embroiled in atmosphere
and characters of ambiguous allegiance. Shot with a gritty lensing by DP Rob
Hardy, Shadow Dancer has an especially
cold, hardened feel to match the atmosphere. There’s a sense that everyone is
both a player and someone getting played as the film cuts back and forth
between Collette’s double-dealing in Ireland and Mac’s investigation in
England.
One doesn’t necessarily need to know all the gritty details
of the cause Collette is fighting for, since her inner troubles, the war in her mind, is far more
palpable and riveting. Shadow Dancer keeps
the drama firmly wrapped in the backdrop of The Troubles, though, so the
political elements are still tangible and they serve as a backdrop to the more
universal elements of Collette’s conflicted devotion to her role as a daughter,
sister, countryman, and mother. Riseborough creates a character that is
resolute, yet caught in the crosshairs of these different loyalties. It’s a
performance that deserves to be seen on the big screen, but the close-ups on Riseborough's powerfully expressive face ensure that Shadow Dancer is a powerful film even on a screen as big as an iPod.
Rating: ★★★½ (out of ★★★★★)
Rating: ★★★½ (out of ★★★★★)
Shadow Dancer is currently available on iTunes.