<\/font>\u00a0<\/p>\n Although in love with a deaf girl, Laura (Tammy Lanchard), he has a trist with Clover Russell (Angelina Jolie), the sister of a fellow Bonesman. She becomes pregnant and they marry just as World War II breaks out and Edward is asked to go to England. He stays away for several years and returns home when his son (Eddie Redmayne) is six years old. By this time, President Truman, sensing the Red threat, has asked General Bill Sullivan (based on the actual character, \u201cWild Bill\u201d Donovan) to begin the CIA; one of his first recruits is Edward Wilson. <\/font><\/p>\n <\/font>\u00a0<\/p>\n <\/font>\u00a0<\/p>\n For as much as Jeffrey Lyons, the movie critic for the NBC affiliate in Los Angeles, hates this movie, I was fascinated by it. For the first time in months I did not look at my watch during a (2:40 minute) movie. And I thought 2006 was a bad year for movies.<\/font><\/p>\n <\/font>\u00a0<\/p>\n Matt Damon\u2019s character seems to hardly change from beginning to end. For those of us trained by James Bond movies, Edward Wilson\u2019s white-bread American life as a spy seems humdrum. But under his eye lids flicker his emotions, his thought processes, and his decisions. <\/font><\/p>\n <\/font>\u00a0<\/p>\n Angelina Jolie is nothing less than brilliant in her role as the New England socialite who seems to want to love Edward, but is ultimately crushed when he shouts, in an unusual show of feeling, that the only reason he married her was because she was pregnant. She deserves awards consideration, as do Damon and Di Nero. In this role Jolie shows has the acting chops to be right up there with actresses like\u00a0my mother\u2019s favorite actress, Bette Davis. Billy Crudup is excellent as the Kim Philby-like character (one of the British Cambridge Five double agents) as are William Hurt as head of the CIA and John Turturro as Edward\u2019s right hand man during WWII and after.<\/font><\/p>\n <\/font>\u00a0<\/p>\n <\/font>\u00a0<\/p>\n Robert Di Nero, who directs and plays Bill Sullivan, is really good on both counts. The film was probably shot in as non-linear a way as the narrative plays out, beginning with the U.S. failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961 and ending when the reason for the failure, and ultimately Wilson\u2019s failure as a husband, father, human being \u2013 but not as an American \u2013 is revealed. Eric Roth, who also wrote Forrest Gump<\/i> and Munich<\/i>, has created a compelling screenplay that once again visits the topic of patriotism\u00a0 <\/span>\u2013 this time as religion and family.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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