Director Billy Ray's last film, Shattered Glass, related the strange but true story of an award-winning journalist who was discovered to have fabricated his high profile news reports. Ray's new film, Breach, covers somewhat similar ground in its account of another apparent model citizen who was in fact systematically abusing and undermining the very system that gave him life.
Breach is the true story of FBI counterintelligence agent Robert Hanssen (Chris Cooper), who was arrested in early 2001 (an event that came to be overshadowed by 9/11) as a long-time spy for the Russians. By most accounts responsible for the most devastating security breach in American history, Hanssen wasn't your typical turncoat. He didn't seem to particularly care about the money, and he certainly didn't turn traitor out of some covert sympathy for Communist ideology. Oddly enough, in his way, Hanssen seemed to truly love his country. He was also a devout Catholic who berated staff members for not praying enough, even as he secretly immersed himself in Internet porn, strippers and homemade sex videos.
Hanssen was, as should be abundantly clear, a complicated guy, and Cooper's performance — which is the best thing about Breach — does a fine job suggesting the tortured, unknown places where the man's complications dwell. Ryan Phillippe doesn't fare quite as well as Eric O'Neill, the FBI employee assigned to spy on Hanssen, and the script doesn't help by saddling him with some poorly motivated bits and pieces (not the least of which is the grudging respect we're supposed to believe is developing between O'Neill and the man he's charged with bringing to justice). Still, Breach manages to hold our interest as a competently made thriller, even if its telling winds up being a bit too conventional for such a curious subject.
Breach (PG-13) Stars Chris Cooper, Ryan Phillippe, Laura Linney, Dennis Haysbert and Caroline Dhavernas. Opens Feb. 16 at local theaters. 3.5 stars —Lance Goldenberg
This article appears in Feb 14-20, 2007.