Spy Game

Updated June 26, 2020 | Infoplease Staff

Spy Game teams up two of America's favorite movie icons for a espionage thriller. Robert Redford stars as a world-weary CIA vet on his final day at the office, during which he learns that a rookie he'd mentored (Brad Pitt) awaits execution in a Chinese prison. This portion of the movie, set in 1991, depicts Redford in fast, cagey combat with his office-bound superiors. Realizing that these paper-pushers are content to let the prisoner die, Redford attempts to pull a final rabbit from his spy's hat.

The bulk of Spy Game occurs in flashbacks. These depict Redford and Pitt collaborating (often with different approaches) in various political hot spots of the past 30 years: Vietnam, Lebanon, Beirut. Spy Game has got action, sure, but it also appeals to a more thoughtful side than most movies of this nature.

While recent film The Tailor of Panama took a parodic angle to old-world spies at the end of the 20th century, Spy Game treats the subject with a weathered romance befitting Redford, who moves through the material admirably.