Movie reviews this week looks at the action thriller Salt, starring Angelina Jolie (Lara Croft) back to her best physically demanding role since Lara Croft, (and I must say how impressed I am by her action scenes seeing she is the proud mother of twins).
The movie begins with Evelyn salt (Angelina Jolie) as a CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) agent, who happens to be asked to interview a self confessed Russian renegade, Orlov (Daniel Olbrychski) who walks into the building and purports to say that he has some news that they should all hear, at first they imagine he is just a delusional old man, and don’t take him seriously, but he doesn’t seem delusional or crazy, and when he tells them he has terminal cancer, they listen a little more inventively to what he has to say. Seeing that Evelyn speaks fluent Russian, the CIA head, Peabody played by the always impressive Chiwetel Ejiafor (Red belt), asks her to interrogate him. As we watch the interrogation, which the CIA monitors with Orlov’s heart beat and brain scan to see if he is telling the truth, he seems to pass all the tests with flying colours. At the end of the interrogation Orlov says something that lands Evelyn, as well as Evelyne’s work colleague who is always on the look out for her best interests Ted Winters played by Liev Schreiber (Xmen Beginnings: Wolverine) on edge. Peabody would like to interrogate her about what Orlov alleges, but Salt knows something is up, and that there isn’t any time for an explanation, so she makes a last dash attempt to leave the building, fearing her husband Mike Krause played by August Diehl (brilliant as the Nazi officer in Inglourious Basterds) is in danger, as it seems her and everyone that is close to her might be implicated in what Orlov has alleged, Peabody on the other hand sees her escape as evidence of guilt.
This begins a cat and mouse chase between the CIA headed by Peabody, and accompanied by Winters to find Salt, and get to the bottom of the allegations Orlov makes, and to prevent Salt from doing what Orlov alleges she is about to do.
Salt is an excellent action movie, and as is customary with many Hollywood themed movies, the movie extrapolates our fears about hidden agents, no doubt with the furor over the recently exposed Russian Spy Ring; and as is standard with Hollywood movies these days, the violence is not for the faint hearted, but the suspense is what makes Salt a great action thriller.