Ghost Writer - B++

In theaters. Rated R, 128 minutes. Trailer.

Shortly after his term as Prime Minister, Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan) sells his memoirs to a US publishing house for $10million and begins work with a ghost writer to complete them. Trouble is, the first 'ghost' is found dead after falling from a ferry and washing up on a desolate beach. So then the publisher selects world weary and solitary Ewan McGregor to complete the memoirs. After a long journey from London to Nantucket, he settles into a deceptively simple writing situation. Click below for more on a near-perfectly realized suspenseful political thriller:

McGregor's character is never named, which fits with his character's disaffectation and general intellectual laziness. His major career accomplishment prior to this job was the ghost writing of a famous musician's autobiography. He is immediately spooked by his predecessor's death and the burgeoning investigation into some of Lang's actions related to terrorism and the United States. The women in Lang's life are his assistant/mistress Amelia (a surprisingly good Kim Catrall) and his intelligent and forceful wife (an excellent Olivia Williams) - they both have chemistry with McGregor and are leary of his role in writing Lang's history. Tom Wilkinson also provides a typically great supporting performance as a pivotal plot point. The film has several layered plot points that slowly reveal and a general mystery that I don't want to come close to ruining.

The film is pleasantly tense the whole time, with each new person appearing onscreen grabbing the audience's attention as a potential player in the mystery. Its not overly political, but had enough mixed in to engage that part of my brain. Most of the time it feels like an old-fashioned mystery/thriller.

Polanski's considerable skills are on full display throughout the film. My favorite directorial flourish was the focus changing when McGregor and Williams are getting to know eachother and the focus goes between them in the same shot several times. There are several funny lines and scenes in the film and it is nice to have a film whose dialogue is aimed at college graduates. The setting is a post-modern house on the edge of the ocean - its isolation is almost a character in the film, and Polanski uses the environment and weather to inform the scenes.

Why the dreaded B++? It is really good, but has some flaws (a couple of draggy spots, a lack of substantial meta-elements, a little hokey at times), so it doesn't deserve the A-.