The Little Drummer Girl (1984) Warner Bros./Action-Thriller RT: 131 minutes Rated R (language, violence, terrorism, brief graphic nudity, some sexual content) Director: George Roy Hill Screenplay: Loring Mandel Music: Dave Grusin Cinematography: Wolfgang Treu Release date: October 19, 1984 (US) Cast: Diane Keaton, Yorgo Voyagis, Klaus Kinski, Sami Frey, Michael Christofer, Eli Danker, Ben Levine, Jonathan Sagall, Shlomit Hagoel, Moti Shirin, David Suchet, Bill Nighy. Box Office: $7.8M (US)
Rating: ** ½
The Little Drummer Girl is one of those movies that should have been great given its pedigree. It’s based on a novel by best-selling spy author John le Carre (The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy). It’s directed by George Roy Hill (Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, The Sting). It stars Academy Award winner Diane Keaton (Annie Hall). SHE’S THE PROBLEM! She’s badly miscast in the lead role. She’s clearly older than the character’s 26 years. Also, I never once believed her as a spy. It’s a big misstep that keeps the movie from reaching its full potential.
The Little Drummer Girl literally starts off with a bang. An Israeli diplomat’s home is blown up by the PLO. The Mossad, headed by Martin Kurtz (Kinski, Fitzcarraldo), recruits Charlie Ross (Keaton), an American actress working in Britain, to infiltrate the Palestinians and identify the terrorist known as Khalil. He’s the one behind the bombing. It’s something of a conflict for Charlie as she’s anti-Zionist. She hates all the killing. All she wants is peace in the Middle East.
They convince Charlie to help them flush out Khalil by posing as the girlfriend of his brother Michel (Shirin) who they have in custody. This means joining their organization and participating in acts of terrorism. She eventually ends up at a desert camp where she is trained as a guerrilla.
I guess nobody ever told Charlie that love and espionage don’t mix. Against all better judgment, she falls for her handler “Joseph” (Voyagis, Zorba the Greek) after initially thinking he’s the masked PLO member she heard speak in Dorset. He’s the one who reels her in to help the Israelis deal with the ongoing threat against their people.
That’s what The Little Drummer Girl is about more or less. It’s a rather convoluted affair. The events of the story are jumbled and you’re never quite sure of the motivations of the characters. I’m guessing the book is pretty complex and trying to condense it all into 131 minutes is a difficult undertaking. Truthfully, I prefer the 2018 miniseries starring Florence Pugh who’s far more believable than Keaton in the title role. She a great actress who’s done some stellar work. She can do righteous indignation well as anyone who’s seen her in Reds (1981) will concur. She is all wrong for to play Charlie. Jodie Foster would have been a better choice. She definitely would have done the role justice.
Kinski, one of my favorite sinister character actors, does well as the head of the Mossad, a man you’re never quite sure has Charlie’s best interests at heart. He’s a spy, spies lie for a living, you do the math. I don’t know if it’s a language barrier thing, but Greek actor Voyagis is fairly wooden. He didn’t really make any sort of impression on me.
I will concede that there are some tense moments in The Little Drummer Girl like the scene where Charlie is supposed to park a car packed with explosives in front of a cafe. An American tourist sees she’s having trouble parking and guides her. The Mossad agents watching her will likely kill him if he makes a perceived wrong move. Unfortunately, there aren’t too many scenes like this. There’s a lot of talking which is normal for le Carre. The characters discuss Israel-Palestine politics as they relate to Charlie’s involvement in the operation. It’s interesting, but the movie only scratches the surface.
The real question at hand is whether or not I liked The Little Drummer Girl, right? For the most part, I enjoyed it. I like a good espionage thriller that deals with politics and terrorism. It’s not a boring movie where you keep looking at your watch or the time counter on the DVD player to see if it’s almost over. It’s actually a compelling piece of work, one that will have the viewer wishing that it had been a better overall film.
The Little Drummer Girl bombed when it came out in fall ’84. I’m actually not surprised. Movies are supposed to be escapist fare, and at the time this movie was made, the conflict between the Jews and Arabs and the activities of the PLO were a nightly feature on the news. The public tends not to shell out money for a film about current events, especially ugly ones like the conflict in the Middle East.
I didn’t see The Little Drummer Girl at the cinema. I didn’t watch it in its entirety until years later when I could fully understand and appreciate it. It moves slowly, but it held my interest. Even so, it’s still something of a disappointment, especially with a filmmaker as competent as Hill guiding things. It really should have been something. It has some good stuff in it, but it doesn’t add up to much.
