Man from Uncle – a relative who satisfies.

 – The original duo are on the right.

We’ve just had the fifth Mission Impossible to keep us on the edge of our seats and right behind Ethan Hawk and his band is Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin reinvented for a lengthy action packed big  screen version of United Network Command for Law and Enforcement (Uncle). It starts with action and essentially continues throughout with an unusual twist (though there is one in M I too!) that one of the female leads is as much at home fixing oily cars in overalls as she is later to appear in the film posing as the ficticious fiancée of Illya Kuryakin (American – Armand Hammer) all for the purposes of espionage (played by Alicia Vikander.) In the 5th M I the aggressive lady does not fix cars but is still cast as having a “rough” side.   Almost craggy  Henry Cavill as Napoleon Solo cuts a dash in some carefully chosen suitably man about town outfits and has to harbour the thought that there was a long list of actors who were apparently approached before him for this diamond part. They include Brad Pitt (who was in another Guy Ritchie production – “Snatch”) Tom Cruise, Bradley Cooper and George Clooney.

The car chase at the beginning not only raises laughs and eyebrows, it also prepares the audience for the US and Russian enemies who are trying to take each other out actually being made to work together each by the agents who manage them and this produces some moments of stoicism and heart searching by both before they can really make tentative friends though always really being rivals. To distinguish one from the other Illya tends to keep his dress code more quasi communist flat cap than uptown, something a bit different from in the TV series, where often the two men seemed to be trying to outshine each other in the clothes and “suave looks” department.  Man from Uncle was originally conceived as a story by none other than Ian Fleming so it has a great pedigree that can take its audience  to familiar heady heights of excitement. Guy Ritchie worked with several other screenwriters to hone the plot and also directed. The required  villainess is played by Elizabeth Debicki –  a very suitable one looking like a throwback to a time when women really did kit themselves out in princessly outfits with breathtaking jewellery and swept back hair together with quite heavily seductive eye makeup, with a china doll appeal closely matched by Alicia Vikander who morphs wholeheartedly into a cutie pie before showing Illya that she likes a rough and tumble – watch the film and you will see what I mean.  Rather frustratingly the pair seem to be about to grab each other and engage in a passionate kiss several times but never quite achieve it – room for that in a sequel? A little more touch of romance would be welcome then to sweeten the plot. Man from Uncle is definitely the type of film it is very difficult to walk past the cinema without planning to see .  Much trouble was clearly taken to make it set in the appropriate period – note the cars, bikes, boats, clothes, drinks, furnishing and most of all the stars.  Enjoy. Penny Nair Price