CIA scandal that got lost amid our obsession with Monica Lewinsky
Kill The Messenger (15) Verdict: Decent political thriller Hyena (18) Verdict: Grisly crime thriller
A powerful political thriller in many ways reminiscent of All The president’s Men, Alan J. pakula’s 1976 film about the watergate conspiracy, Kill The Messenger tells the true story of a dogged i nvestigative reporter for an unfashionable Californian newspaper, who uncovered what he called a ‘dark alliance’ between the CIA, Nicaraguan rebels and cocaine traffickers.
It was in 1995 that Gary webb, of the San Jose Mercury News (splendidly played by Jeremy renner), received a phone call from a woman claiming to have evidence that a drugs baron was on the CIA payroll.
webb duly discovered that during ronald reagan’s presidency, vast profits from selling crack cocaine, mainly in South Central los Angeles, had been piped back to Nicaragua to support the u.S.backed Contras. It was a huge story, and yet it broke around the time that the media were more interested in Bill Clinton and Monica lewinsky’s dress.
Michael Cuesta’s film is itself just as interested in the efforts by the government and even other newspapers to discredit webb, who paid a high personal price for his journalistic triumphs. It’s no surprise to find that Cuesta has also directed episodes of the superb TV drama Homeland; he knows how to escalate tension, and also how to fold his protagonist’s domestic dramas into the story.
rosemarie Dewitt is terrific as webb’s long- suffering wife, and part of a top-notch supporting cast also i ncluding Michael Sheen, ray liotta, Andy Garcia and paz Vega.
HYENA is a thriller, too, but much, much grislier. It is set in a west london netherworld of irredeemably venal policemen and horrible Albanian gangsters, and contains images of violence and rape that could scarcely be more disturbing.
The closest thing to a hero is undercover police officer Michael logan (the excellent peter ferdinando), but since he’s also cokeaddicted and deeply corrupt, you’ll get an idea of what everyone else in the film is like. logan’s concern for a woman sold into sex slavery is what amounts to the picture’s moral core.
Nonetheless, writer- director Gerard Johnson has a good eye and ear for sleaze and depravity, and I really do mean that as a compliment.