Espionage thrillers normally site visitors in globe-trotting mayhem, so in “All of the Outdated Knives,” it’s refreshing to seek out one whose most important substances are two stars out-smoldering one another over dinner.
Chris Pine performs Henry, a C.I.A. operative. Thandiwe Newton performs Celia, a colleague who left the company after their staff in Vienna did not resolve a flight hijacking that resulted in mass fatalities. The current motion is ready eight years later. The top of their division (Laurence Fishburne) has realized {that a} mole might have fed data to the perpetrators. If it was Celia, Henry, her former lover, is ideally located to catch her in a lie.
So the 2 previous flames meet in a water-view restaurant in Carmel-by-the-Sea, Calif., to gab about how recent the fish is, how good the bacon on Henry’s appetizer smells and whether or not Celia leaked secrets and techniques to worldwide terrorists. Flashbacks present us who was the place and when. And aside from a show-offy (obvious) single take that swans across the Vienna workplace introducing personnel, the director, Janus Metz, working from a screenplay by Olen Steinhauer (who additionally wrote the novel), principally retains issues quick and simple, making every thing seem like {a magazine} unfold.
One draw back of the small scale is that it solely permits for a handful of suspects; the incriminating name Celia might have positioned might simply as simply have come from her boss (Jonathan Pryce, delivering infinitely refined variations on the right way to act nervous in each scene). Whereas “All of the Outdated Knives” retains cleverly resetting the desk it’s laid out, it could possibly’t basically alter the meal.
All of the Outdated Knives
Rated R. Intercourse, with a touch of Viennese sophistication. Working time: 1 hour 41 minutes. In theaters and on Amazon Prime Video.