Secret in Their Eyes

Back when Juan Jose Campanella’s The Secret in Their Eyes came out in 2010, I was greatly impressed — giving it the highest possible recommendation. But, as sometimes happens, the film faded from my mind over time. I could remember that I thought it was great, but not why. Nor could I remember much about the film, making me suspect that I had very likely overrated it. This is something that most often happens with movies that are largely plot-driven — once the story is told, there’s just not much left. I had much the same experience with Guillaume Canet’s 2008 thriller Tell No One and Claude LeLouch’s Roman de Gare (also 2008). (A case can be made that this is more related to foreign language thrillers than anything else.) This is less a criticism than an observation. Some movies — no matter how well-made or how entertaining — simply don’t have much replay value. Seeing Billy Ray’s Americanized remake of Campanella’s film brought this home with a vengeance.

Despite the changes made in Secret in Their Eyes — more has been altered than dropping the “The,” changing the location and shooting it in English — the new film brought the original back to mind in all its structural cleverness. It also reminded me just where all this was leading, and, once I knew, my involvement with it all lessened by the minute. While I could appreciate the same cleverness inherent in the original, I wasn’t really invested in the plot. But — and I cannot stress this enough — Secret in Their Eyes is by no means a bad movie, and I strongly suspect that anyone who doesn’t know the story will find much to like. Even while waiting for things to happen — as opposed to waiting to see what would happen — I liked the film and found a good bit to admire.

Without giving away too much about the plot, I can say that the story works in two time periods taking place 13 years apart. (In the original, the gap was 25 years.) But the film is not linear. It moves back and forth between an old murder case and a present-day attempt to bring the killer to justice. In the new film, Chiwetel Ejiofor plays Ray, a former FBI agent who can’t let go of the 2002 case that changed his life and the lives of the two other main characters, L.A. District Attorney Claire (Nicole Kidman) and his former police partner Jess (Julia Roberts). That murder took place when he was working a Homeland Security detail in conjunction with the LAPD and he and Jess were called in because it took place near a Mosque. The victim turned out to be Jess’ daughter. Although Ray identified the killer (Joe Cole) fairly quickly, the evidence wasn’t there to hold the man — in part because he was a police informant inside the Mosque — and he disappeared. Thinking he’s spotted the killer in the police files, Ray (now a private investigator) returns to L.A. to re-open the case, along with a lot of old, unhealed wounds — including his unrequited (or unacted-upon) love for Claire.

It is tempting to read too much into the Homeland Security/Islam aspects of the film (the original dealt with government corruption), but it’s mostly just window dressing that happens to be unfortunately relevant. That aspect of the movie doesn’t really go anywhere beyond the purely functional, since this is a character-study mystery, not a political film in the strict sense. Honestly, any other bureaucracy would work as well. What makes Secret in Their Eyes work lies in carefully recreating key high points from the original — the stadium sequence, the elevator encounter, the plot twist, etc. — and the performances of the three leads. Ejiofor is outstanding as Ray, the obsessed, damaged, romantic idealist. In fact, both his character and his performance suggest a better film than the one we get. Kidman is also very fine as the slightly enigmatic Claire, who tries to balance her feelings with her position in the world. Then there’s the utterly de-glammed Roberts going from wisecracking cop to the shell of a woman over the course of the proceedings. Her performance is flawless, but the film errs somewhat in the total glamming down of the actress. It’s not wrong-headed — it makes perfect sense when the full story is known — but it is distracting in its extreme nature. A great movie? No. But it’s a good one with great things in it. Rated PG-13 for thematic material involving disturbing violent content, language and some sexual references.