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Our Kind of Traitor

Our Kind of Traitor

Movie · 2016 · 15 people

John le Carré's 2010 novel of the same name became Our Kind of Traitor (released in Turkey as Hain), a British spy thriller of 2016 that Hossein Amini scripted and Susanna White directed. Produced by Potboiler Productions and running about 108 minutes, it opened in the United Kingdom on May 13, 2016 via StudioCanal, in Russia on May 12, 2016, and in Turkey on July 22, 2016.

The story starts when Perry Makepeace, a university lecturer on holiday in Morocco with his wife Gail, befriends a flamboyant Russian called Dima. Ewan McGregor plays Perry, Naomie Harris plays Gail, Stellan Skarsgård plays Dima, and Damian Lewis plays Hector. Embedded in the Russian mafia's money-laundering network and worried for his family's safety, Dima wants to pass evidence linking the mob to corrupt British politicians and businessmen to the secret service through Perry. The ordinary couple, used as bait to disrupt a Russian oligarch's plans, is caught between the mob and MI6 and slowly realises that neither can be trusted. Alicia von Rittberg and Grigori Dobrıgin also appear.

Le Carré had seen other novels of his adapted for the screen before. A review in Turkey judged this adaptation to be no better than average, though it keeps the audience engaged.

DirectorSusanna White
Production companyPotboiler Productions
Our Kind of Traitor

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Grigori Dobrıgin Grigori Dobrıgin Film actor · 40 years old Ewan McGregor Stellan Skarsgård Naomie Harris Damian Lewis Mark Stanley Alicia von Rittberg Jeremy Northam Saskia Reeves Alec Utgoff Rasha Bukvic Pawel Szajda Velibor Topiç Khalid Abdalla Marek Oravec

Through different eyes

Action & Thriller Fan Puts pace, tension and set pieces first; little patience for slow drama.

Since it's a le Carré adaptation, know this going in: it's a spy thriller built on distrust rather than explosions. An ordinary couple caught between the mob and MI6 gives a real sense of risk, and their dawning realisation that they can trust neither side keeps the tension alive. But the pace dips at times, and anyone expecting a classic action film may need some patience.

Cinephile Looks at script, editing and directing choices; keeps a distance from formula films.

Hossein Amini's screenplay tries to keep le Carré's trademark moral murk: neither the mob nor the secret service is a side you can trust. The liveliest thing about the film is putting Dima, a flamboyant Russian, at the centre of the story; his position, both dangerous and in need of protection, gives the plot the energy it needs. By contrast, building Perry and Gail as the audience's ordinary-people stand-ins leaves the two of them rather faint. Susanna White's direction is tidy and clear, but for anyone who remembers earlier le Carré adaptations the layers of character feel thin. As a Turkish review put it, this is solid craft that rarely rises above average but keeps the audience engaged.

History & Society Lens Asks about the period, the social background and what the work reflects.

The film's real subject is dirty money seeping across borders into respectable institutions. The link between the Russian mafia's laundering network and corrupt British politicians and businessmen is a reminder that crime is organised not only in dark streets but in boardrooms too. Using a university lecturer and his wife as bait also asks how readily state institutions treat ordinary citizens as tools. Adapted from le Carré's 2010 novel, the story reflects its era's anxieties about oligarchs and global money; that theme, however, sometimes stays on the surface behind the thriller formula.

These are not reader reviews: they are short editorial takes written from different viewer perspectives with AI assistance. Reader reviews are below.

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