'Traitor' is a spy thriller with a brain

'TRAITOR” is a movie that has a lot on its mind. Set among the terrorists who may be waiting out there for us, it is unnervingly schizophrenic. It often seems important and just as often seems a standard thriller.

There is not likely to be a big commercial audience for a film that tries to understand the thinking of Muslim terrorists. (Even though, it might be a better world if there were). This is a movie in which a seemingly sane man looks directly into the camera and says something to the effect that “the Americans like to brag that they are a democracy, a government of all the people, so all the people must bear the responsibility for the crimes of the American government. There are no innocents.”

While preserving all the cliches of Muslim terrorists (complete with a scene in which one leader sips champagne as he sends a youth out on a suicide mission), it also asks that we understand their motivations – a bit.

Its moral ambiguity makes it difficult to get at the center of this movie.

The saving grace, a major one, is Don Cheadle, who plays the apparent terrorist who may be working for the American government. Cheadle is adept at suggesting conflicting thoughts. His specialty is suggesting tough conviction with more than a hint of vulnerability.

As Samir Horn, he is torn. He wants to do the right thing, but he’s trapped in a world that demands that the wrong thing is needed in order to win.

Cheadle was greatly hailed for his Oscar-nominated performance in “Hotel Rwanda” (2004). Perhaps his best performance, as an over-the-top radio disc jockey in 2007’s “Talk to Me,” went all but unnoticed. He seems uncomfortable when relegated to commercial things like “Ocean’s Eleven,”  “Twelve” and “Thirteen.” In any case, he is a fine actor and gets a lively, if confusing, turn here.

Cheadle’s character, Samir, was born in the Sudan but lives in America. He seems to be a devout Muslim. We meet him in the Sudan in 1978. He is arrested and confined in a Yemeni prison, where he is adopted by fervent terrorists who are clearly of the al-Qaida brand.

He looks tormented and hurt with each violent murder he engineers. Since he is Don Cheadle and has top billing, he must be on “our” side, but we have serious doubts when we see him engineer an attack on the American Embassy in Nice, France, an explosion that kills eight innocents.

  When Samir’s only link to “official” America is eliminated, we know he’s in a bad spot. Even if he’s not a ruthless terrorist, an FBI agent is trying to bring him down.

To the rescue comes an American agent played by the fine actor Guy Pearce, who should have emerged as a major star after “L.A. Confidental” but never quite got the right part. This isn’t it either, because he has little to do except chase Cheadle. He’s so dedicated that he has even learned Arabic. He’s so efficient that he makes us feel comfortable amid all the real-life reports claiming that America messes up all the time.

On the other hand, his partner (Neal McDonough) is a hothead who beats up prisoners while growling something like, “I must have left my Bill of Rights at home.” (What we’re exporting via the movies to countries around the world cannot be good for our image).

Eventually, we learn there is a plot to put bombs on buses all over the United States. At last, a plot that sounds like a movie rather than a sermon.

We get a whirlwind travelogue of aerial shots from London to Marseille to Chicago to Yemen to Los Angeles and, of course, Washington. It’s all meant to make it feel like a documentary.

In the end, it looks suspiciously like a standard spy thriller but, blessedly, one that makes us think. It’s the ticket if you’re stuck in the mall and want to play a mind game about current world chaos.

There might not be many of you, but those who want to escape mindless movies are advised to try this one.

Mal Vincent, (757) 446-2347,  mal.vincent@pilotonline.com