Film reveals exciting political game

By Christopher Kelly

McClatchy Newspapers

For its first 80 minutes, the fact-based drama “Fair Game,” directed by Doug Liman (“The Bourne Identity”), crackles with urgency and intelligence.

We meet CIA agent Valerie Plame (Naomi Watts), an operative specializing in the Middle East, whose husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson (Sean Penn), is dispatched on a mission to Niger to search for yellowcake uranium.

No uranium turns up — proof, Wilson believes, that the Bush administration’s claims about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq are false.

What happens next remains one of the most controversial chapters of the Bush era: Wilson writes a scathing article critical of administration officials; Plame’s cover is then blown by the administration in retaliation.

The screenplay, by British playwright Jez Butterworth and his brother, John-Henry, based on memoirs by Plame and Wilson, glosses over some key details in the case: the protracted saga involving New York Times reporter Judith Miller and columnist Robert Novak, who were both leaked information about Plame’s identity; and the bizarre Vanity Fair photo shoot that seemed to present Wilson and Plame in glammed-up Hollywood superstar fashion.

This might just be that rare Hollywood movie that could have afforded to be another 20 or 30 minutes longer.

But what the filmmakers do capture brilliantly is the human cost of espionage and political gamesmanship.