THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, September 13, 1995 TAG: 9509140546
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E5 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Movie review
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, MOVIE CRITIC
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines
WITH A CAST like this, how could a movie go wrong?
``The Innocent,'' based on Ian McEwan's 1990 novel about spying in the divided post World War II city of Berlin, manages somehow to never catch fire, in spite of all the talent involved. But it is quite watchable, especially for those who like old-fashioned melodramas with structured plots.
There's also something mischievously ironic about seeing Ingrid Bergman's daughter play a tearful, romantic clinch on an airplane runaway as lovers face a final decision. She looks so much like Mom what you might for a moment think this is a colorized ``Casablanca.''
Campbell Scott, the son of Virginia native George C. Scott and the late Broadway earth-mother Colleen Dewhurst, is terribly miscast as the title character - a virginal Brit who knows a great deal more about electronics than women. Scott, who is a fine actor when cast believably, tries valiantly to suggest both a British accent and naivete as he portrays Leonard, a young telephone engineer.
He arrives in Berlin in the 1950s to work in a joint CIA and M16 (British Intelligence) effort to tunnel 100 yards inside the Russian sector and tap the Communist phones. The mission is presented in such a casual manner that it never suggests the tension that existed in the city during this time.
Leonard falls in love with a mystery woman played by the luminous Isabella Rossellini, a personality who is so charming and likable that we often have trouble thinking of her as an actress too.
Rossellini is Italian-Swedish but the accent serves, just barely, as German here. She picks up Leonard and seems almost too eager to end his virginity. She uses her winning smile a bit less than usual here and almost suggests a woman who might be up to no good.
Leonard's boss, a vulgar Yankee played by Oscar winner Anthony Hopkins, immediately suspects that she's out to weasel secrets out of his prize engineer. Besides, Hopkins has eyes for her himself.
The object here is to weave a world of duplicity and deceit. The audience should be driven to paranoia. Even the English and American allies dislike one another. These spies, though, seem to have come in out of the cold somewhere on the written page.
Academy Award winner director John Schlesinger pushes the story forward relentlessly, but slowly. Schlesinger is not up to the demand here, even if he did create some of our fondest movie memories (his Oscar for the classic 1969 ``Midnight Cowboy'' as well as the psychologically believable ``Sunday, Bloody Sunday''). Schlesinger has even had experience in the spy arena, via ``Marathon Man'' and ``The Falcon and the Snowman.''
It is puzzling, though, why he would cast British Hopkins as such a stereotyped American character and the young American Scott as a Brit. Hopkins, who probably took the role in an effort to prove that he can play American, is brash, impatient and paranoid, but never quite gritty enough to suggest this kind of conniving opportunist. You half expect him to pour a cup of tea rather than the hard liquor the character prefers.
There is a murder and there are romantic twists but nothing seems either gripping or suspenseful.
This may be a rather morose outing, but it is always a watchable one. These actors work hard, and it is consistently interesting to watch them work. ILLUSTRATION: Graphic
MOVIE REVIEW
``The Innocent''
Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Isabella Rossellini, Campbell Scott, Hart
Bochner
Director: John Schlesinger
MPAA Rating: R (some sexuality, but mostly mild)
Mal's Rating: Two 1/2 stars
Location: Lynnhaven Mall, lower level
by CNB