The East (2013)

☆ ☆ ½

The East (2013) – Z. Batmanglij

Brit Marling (who also co-wrote the film) stars as an agent for a private intelligence firm that sends her undercover to infiltrate an anarchist group (“the East”) that is attacking corporations that have poisoned and polluted the environment.  Of course, she begins to feel a part of this group of warm and lovable rebels who really want the right things (but who are using the wrong methods).  Things unfold pretty gradually but with a slick thriller framework that means that deeper character development and the more serious implications of the issues at hand are foregone in lieu of pulse-quickening music and tense action scenes and some romance for good measure.  But even in the film’s quieter moments, you get the feeling that you’ve been here before (even if the surface details – a private spy agency? -- are rather new).  Nevertheless, a strong female lead in a thriller is always welcome; it’s just too bad that the script can’t quite rise above its schematic set up.  Perhaps too it is deeply ambivalent about whether evil corporations should be fought by any means necessary or not. The moral complexity of these issues deserves a more contemplative treatment than the Hollywood thriller format can offer.