Film Is Now

Polanski’s pre-announced absence from the German festival – he is under house arrest as a result of an old incidence of violence – seems to have shone an even brighter light on the new, Hitchcockian thriller by the Polish director, judging by the hordes of journalists that crowded the Berlinale Palast the morning of the presentation.

In the film, a successful writer (McGregor) accepts to ghost write the biography of former British Prime Minister Adam Lang (former 007 Brosnan), after the previous assistant disappeared in a mysterious accident.

The writer, known only as The Ghost in the story, goes to stay in the big house on an island off the East Coast in the US, where the politician lives his wife Ruth and his staff, led by the rigid Amelia, who coordinates and supervises the man’s public life.

However, the set-up, which The Ghost has accepted seemingly only for the money, soon unveils numerous dark sides: when Lang is accused of having caused the deaths of many English soldiers in Iraq, the writer uncovers secrets linking the man to the CIA and decides to throw light on the affair.

The references to the personal and political lives of Tony and Cherry Blair are obvious beginning from the screenplay, based on the novel by British journalist and writer Robert Harris, who sent Polanski a copy in 2007, before it was published.

(Source: Cineuropa)