If there is one element that defined the Dreyfus case, that was "passion"; the whole affaire was permeated by several, very powerful passions: passion for power, passion for intrigue, passion for truth, passion against the jews, passion for honour, passion for politics. Well, the main flaw of the movie is its inability to deliver such an ordeal of passions and its tone of voice remains quite shallow all along the movie. Also, the movie is totally unbalanced: it's very thorough in the first part, looking at every details of the fabricated evidence case against Dreyfus; then the second half, that of the new trial, is incredibly rushed, so we lose a lot of the dramatic events of that phase of the affaire. From a director like Roma Polanski I would have expected a much higher standard of quality; to conclude on a positive note, Jean Dujardin's performance is very good.
Review of An Officer and a Spy
