The Courier (2020)
The Courier (2020) another movie I missed when it came out. Perhaps the fact that it was initially shown at the end of January of 2020 as COVID was making its way through the United States had something to do with it. The full release was delayed until October of 2020 as we waited for some degree of normalcy to return. Needless to say, it was not a box office hit.
The movie is an intelligence and espionage drama set in the early 1960s as the Cold War raged and the Cuban Missile Crisis approached.
The film is based on the true story of Oleg Penkovsky and Greville Wynne.
Penkovsky was a Soviet GRU (military intelligence) officer who worked on the State Committee for Science and Technology. This gave him access to nuclear and missile technology information.
He became concerned that the boisterous Nikita Khrushchev was driving the world into a nuclear war and decided to give information about the Soviet arsenal to the United States. At that time, the Soviets has fewer bombs then they claimed and no ICBM capability. You may remember that Kennedy ran his 1960 campaign on the missile gap, a scare tactic created to get more votes. Penkovsky wanted the truth to get out so Khrushchev’s bluster was not taken seriously by the west.
Greville Wynne was a British businessman. He was seemingly unremarkable, other than having a gift of gab, a tippling way, and plenty of business interests behind the Iron Curtain. He was recruited by MI6 and the CIA to act as a courier for Penkovsky’s information. He boldly traveled to Moscow on several occasions to bring critical intelligence back to the west.
The Courier was directed by Dominic Cooke, who although known mostly for theatre work, does a good job here. He had previously worked with award winning actor Benedict Cumberbatch, and was able to recruit him for the role of Greville Wynne. Cumberbatch is, as usual, excellent in the film. Merab Ninidze (Conclave, Homeland) plays Oleg Penkovsky. Ninidze was born in Soviet Georgia, and began his career there, but immigrated after the USSR dissolved. He brings his life experience to the role and nails the part.
Rachel Brosnahan plays the aggressive but loyal CIA agent Emily Donovan. Angus Wright is the more practical and cautious MI6 handler, Dickie Franks (who would later rise to the lead the agency). It’s a solid cast, but, as you would expect, Cumberbatch steals the show.
The film is filled with all the fittings of an old fashioned spy thriller. Secret messages, micro cameras, dead drops, and clandestine meetings all bring some excitement to the story. But mostly this is a drama about the people who risked their lives for a cause. Courage, dedication, and loyalty are the major themes here.
The Greville Wynne and Oleg Penkovsky characters put their lives on the line for peace and the greater good. The Cuban Missile Crisis was the closest that the world came to nuclear annihilation, and these two men were willing to die trying to prevent a global cataclysm. Both men were loyal not only to their cause, but to each other. Wynne in particular returned to the Soviet Union, even though he believed that his operation may have been compromised. He was willing to risk everything to save Penkovsky and his family.
And it was compromised.
In headlines this week, the supposedly great intellects at Cambridge University were shown to have been willfully duped by the bald faced and obvious lies of Jason Arday. They were willing to hire this fraudster as a professor in the blind pursuit of diversity. This was not the first time that individuals from Cambridge were willingly duped into believing lies. In the 1930’s a group of Cambridge University students bought into the lies of communism and became spies for the Soviet Union.
This group, known as the Cambridge 5, worked their way into the British intelligence service and compromised numerous western intelligence and technology operations. The damage done by this group was incalculable. They likely compromised this operation as well, as George Blake, an associate of Cambridge 5 spies Kim Philby and Donald McLean, gave up British spy Janet Chisholm. Chisholm was a contact for Oleg Penkovsky, and the Soviets likely learned of his activities by following her.
The Courier runs a little less than two hours. The film is a drama with several moments of suspense, but if you are looking for chases and shootouts, you will have to look elsewhere. Dominic Cooke, however, does a good job of relating the story in a compelling and entertaining way. You can catch the film for free on YouTube.
This is an important movie for today’s audience, as the horrors of the communist Soviet regime seem to have been forgotten by today’s youth. The film shows that many of the problems of communism were solved with a bullet to the head. The death toll of international communism should never be forgotten as Americans are now going to the polls and pulling the lever in support of an ideology that caused untold death, destruction, and misery. In 1991, the world felt that communism was on the way to the dustbin of history. We must work to ensure in arrives there eventually.
Thanks for reading The Ops Desk. Stay Safe!
Thanks for tip. Great film. Great acting!
Watched it when it came out. Great movie and relevant to today.