The Ghost Writer

4/11/2017

Such an eerie and haunting movie… I expected just another political thriller, but this is so much more interesting… The remote setting, the media storm… the layered motivations of the characters, sexual, financial, political etc… It was also great to see cinematography that wasn’t just close ups of talking heads, which is the norm for these kinds of movies… I also liked the parallels to the real world, the Blair-esque prime minister, the Middle Eastern wars and such, but also that it really is it’s own movie and is more concerned with painting a certain world than with commenting on current events…

4/14/2024

It's quite difficult to watch this in the UK and not draw parallels with a certain real former Prime Minister - especially given the way "Lang" is rather chummily played by Pierce Brosnan. He is trying to have his memoirs written, and after an accident robs him of the incumbent, his team alight on a man who shows no interest in or has any knowledge of politics. This nameless character (Ewan McGregor) is given strict instruction about the manuscript, whom he can talk to or about it to and his subject and wife "Ruth" (Olivia Williams) seems approachable enough. His investigations, though, start to arouse a few suspicions - especially when he begins to feel like he is being watched, followed and manipulated. "Lang" is soon publicly caught up in some war crime investigations and his ghost writ