Doing the right thing is unpopular in this story. And there’s Tom Hanks pretending to be middle-aged Jimmy Stewart in the middle of it all. So his defense at the spy trial is assigned to a reluctant Donovan, who worked as a prosecution counsel during the trial of Nazi criminals in Nuremberg following World War II. But the film does feel heavy-handed at times.
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Tom Hanks portrays Donovan, and the role fits perfectly with his Everyman skills. He fights a good fight all the way to the Supreme Court.
Halfway through, “Bridge of Spies” sends the hero to Berlin to negotiate a spy swap, Abel for Francis Gary Powers (Austin Stowell), whose high-tech spy plane has gone down over Soviet territory in the film’s most rousing action sequence. Despite several courtroom chances for showboating, he doesn’t. But never does Hanks make Donovan seem any more heroic than the guy next door.
That approach produces a measured, cumulative kind of inspiration in an audience, based on wisdom rather than emotion.
Here, Spielberg is in his element-for that matter, so is Hanks-and Bridge of Spies nicely captures the aura of frosty suspicion at the heart of the Cold War. He plays a broad range of expertly gauged expression, from diplomatic persuasion to insistent urgency.
Spielberg is working off of a smart script, written by relative newcomer Matt Charman and then burnished expertly by Ethan and Joel Coen, one that builds drama in the smallest of moments.
Captured pilot Powers is a minor player. Spielberg’s signature touches include scenes of American schoolchildren watching real-life “safety” movies telling them to duck and cover and a quick glimpse of a wrenching parallel as Donovan sees children at recess, climbing in a way that echoes the desperate escape attempts he had just seen.
The movie also features performances by Mark Rylance, Amy Ryan and Alan Alda.
The stoicism Rylance’s and Hank’s and characters show joins in a duet of perseverance against overwhelming odds.
“Bridge” is set mostly in the 1950s, when the Cold War between the Americans and the Soviets was heating up – and the East Germans, filled with grievance toward the United States and disgust for the Russians. Like an overly enthusiastic 8-year-old being asked about their first day of school, Spielberg can’t decide if he wants to tell you about his teacher, or his new best friend, or the playground, or the bird’s egg he found at recess that’s now in his lunch pail, or that the tree where he found the egg would be a really good climbing tree but the yard monitors said he’s not allowed to climb any trees and needs to stay on the playground.
Later, Donovan applies that same determined sense of justice to his negotiations for Powers’ release. So confident was Hanks as Donovan, his director and pal was even a bit intimidated. Not one of the Master of Suspense’s classic thrillers, but the top-heavy global late-career Hitch of “Topaz” and “Torn Curtain”.
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There are no “good old days” in Bridge of Spies; it’s a film populated by petty, fearful men and women ready to sacrifice the ideals they supposedly believe in at the drop of a hat.
