Time: 158 Minutes
Age Rating: R16– Violence & content that may disturb
Cast:
Wagner Moura as Marcelo
Carlos Francisco as Seu Alexandre
Tânia Maria as Dona Sebastiana
Robério Diógenes as Euclides
Maria Fernanda Cândido as Elza
Gabriel Leone as Bobbi
Director: Kleber Mendonça Filho

The New Zealand International Film Festival has begun and I have chosen 5 movies to watch during its run. The first film is The Secret Agent. I knew that it won Best Director and Best Actor for Wagner Moura at the Cannes Film Festival. Otherwise I didn’t know anything about the movie going in and it was a pleasant surprise.

The Secret Agent is definitely a slow burn (especially in the first half) and it takes a while for you to figure out what the movie is about, but I was engaged and locked in from the beginning. It is very much character driven with its focus on its protagonist, and the plot slowly reveals itself. It begins with quite a tense scene and it maintains an element of underlying tension throughout. Despite the title, The Secret Agent is not an espionage thriller, but is nonetheless a political thriller set in the 1970s towards the final years of the military dictatorship in Brazil. It is very much about the political climate of that time and place; there’s a lot of historical details and intrigue which had me interested throughout. At the same time, you’ll be surprised by some of the tonal shifts and unexpectedly bizarre and silly moments which subvert expectations, but personally worked for me. As it progresses, you will come to learn there is a narrative framing device set in the modern day. For a while, it didn’t really work for me; every time it cut to that subplot, it broke the flow of the story, and the transitions between the two time periods were very rough. However, there is an actual payoff for that by the end, and I do like how the film concluded.

Wagner Moura is excellent in the lead role. He’s very compelling and believable to watch, and made for a very engaging protagonist. The rest of the cast are really good too, Tânia Maria was especially a standout in her screentime.

Kleber Mendonça Filho directs this, and it turns out that I had seen his previous feature film, Bacurau, which was also quite good. His work here in The Secret Agent is great, it’s very well crafted with beautiful cinematography and great editing.

The Secret Agent is a slow burn and engaging historical political thriller, well directed and with an excellent lead performance from Wagner Moura.