Shadow Dancer DVD Review

Director: James Marsh

Running Time: 102 minutes

Certificate: 15

Starring: Clive Owen, Andrea Riseborough, Gillian Anderson, Aidan Gillen, Domhnall Gleeson

Extras: The World Of Shadow Dancer, Theatrical Trailer, Commentary by director James Marsh and writer Tom Bradby

Taken from his own novel, Tom Bradby has adapted SHADOW DANCER for his first feature with James Marsh of MAN ON WIRE and RED RIDING fame taking the directorial reigns. Bradby was a television correspondent in Northern Ireland in the 1990s and has brought to the cinema screen, a slow-paced yet tension-filled drama that perceptively gets inside the life of Collette McVeigh (Andrea Riseborough), an IRA member who becomes a spy for MI5 in order to try and find a future for herself and her son.

She’s picked up by MI5 officer Mac (the ever intense Clive Owen), after her failed attempt to bomb the London Underground who gives her the choice to either go to prison and lose her young boy, or head back to Belfast to spy on her brothers and family, who are in the IRA. Collette is torn between helping herself and family allegiance and one day it comes to a head, when information leaks from an unknown source within the family and then it all starts to kick off, but patiently, subtly and with a lot more effect.

It’s an often understated emphasis in these days of hyper-explosive thrillers, where hand-to-hand combat skills come as a seventh sense and there’s always an escape. What SHADOW DANCER does so successfully is boil it down to the truths of reality, where Collette appears she wants to change but doesn’t contemplate all the consequences. However, she’s by no means a wailing or weak character and evidently a lot stronger than she might seem. Collette is one concentrated force strikingly played by EE Rising Star nominee Andrea Riseborough.

Clive Owen puts on a customary performance as MI5 agent Mac but with a slight edge of his CLOSER role. Mac appears to be somewhat a lone ranger out against countless organisations both inside and out of the agency and with it,  you never quite feel that he’s got the support he’s told he has and particularly from his wary boss Kate Fletcher, down-played by Gillian Anderson but with a sense of something going on beneath.

You could find SHADOW DANCER slightly too slow paced in places, where the underpinned tension is noticeable occasionally a little too lulled. However, if you enjoyed the smart steps of the likes of TINKER, TAILOR, SOLDIER, SPY then this intelligent, spy thriller SHADOW DANCER will definitely be something to take a look at, plus Andrea Riseborough is a outstanding and gives a superb performance to keep it all ticking over.

SHADOW DANCER is available to pre-order now and released on January 14th.