This has a lot going for it - top-of-the-line performing from the two leads downwards, sure-footed direction, fine sense of claustrophobia, tasty camera-work - but against that is a complete derivativeness, we 've been seeing variations on this ever since the Cold War so where we once had novelty now we have only comparison shopping i.e. is this as good as x, how does Cluzet compare with y, does Podaldes eclipse z. Coming off a nervous breakdown, unemployed and without change of a match Cluzet fields a mysterious phone call and is offered a post with strings; the job is transcribing tapes of tapped phone calls, the strings are he may not leave the windowless room in which the transcribing is done even for lunch. In terms of inscrutability Podalydes makes the average Chinese diplomat seem gregarious but, inevitably, things begin to spiral beyond Cluzet's ability to control them. Worth seeing for the two leads if nothing else.
Review of The Eavesdropper
