On Friday I finally, after many months of waiting, went to see Roman Polanski’s ‘The Ghost’, his film based on the novel written by Robert Harris. Robert Harris’ fall out with the Blairs, after being friends with both of them for some years, was fuelled predominantly by the Iraq war, and he hasn’t been shy over the last few years in making clear his personal dislike for Cherie Blair. Despite the scandal surrounding Polanski, he’s always made great films and the mix of the potential quality of the film-making and the dramatic story involving Britain’s most intriguing political character made The Ghost an irresistible watch.
Polanski doesn’t let the viewers down with the quality of cinematography. Much of the film is set on a wind- and rain-swept island presumably in Massachusetts, USA, and the location provides a dramatic and moody backdrop which certainly helps create tension. Before moving to the States however, the film spends a little while in London, although the London scenes look like they were filmed in a studio – a shame considering Polanski’s stature and the overall high quality of the film.
The main gist of the plot surrounds Ewan McGregor’s character, who remains nameless throughout the film which I thought was clever, who has been hired by Adam Lang’s US lawyer (Lang representes Tony Blair) to assist in finishing off Lang’s memoirs.
The film really gets going when Lang’s character enters the frame, played expertly by one of my favourite actors, Pierce Brosnan. Brosnan plays Tony Blair incredibly well, the idiosyncrasies are all correct, although the fictional Lang is more aggressive than Blair – a sort of Blair on steroids! You really get a sense of former Prime Minister Lang as a very lonely, almost lost character, isolated completely from the world by menacing armed protection officers, motorcades, walls and private jets. One wonders exactly what Tony Blair’s life is like nowadays, and I suspect there are some close similarities.
Polanski and Harris went to lengths to show Lang’s character as an actor, which certainly alludes to the image of Tony Blair as the actor – not a real politician but somebody who could do a very good job of pretending. And there are scenes throughout the film where Lang faces the press or the public and you certainly see a different side of him to the behind-the-scenes Lang.
The plot is quite slow for a while, almost every scene involving a mixture of an erratic Ruth Lang (based on Cherie Blair), the rainy backdrop, glamorous Kim Cattrall who plays Lang’s assistant (which I thought was based on Ruth Turner, who has had aspersions cast on herself because of the nature of her close relationship with Blair – pure rumour I should say), and the ever-present menacing security guards which were used in the film as a tool to heighten tension and generally make McGregor’s character appear watched and surveilled the whole time.
As the story got more exciting, it became more laughable. The story line itself didn’t focus as much on war crimes as I had thought it would, which did make me happy! I didn’t want to watch two hours of pontificating by Polanski about international law, and thankfully war crimes only made a cameo appearance. The real story line is hidden until you get at least half way through, and it doesn’t fully emerge until the very last scene, despite Polanski’s attempts to mislead the audience with one or two serious plot twists. There was one particular twist which I certainly didn’t like but it seemed completely possible in real life and would be shocking if it did happen – I’ll let you watch the film and find out for yourself.
In conclusion, I’d say The Ghost is a good film. Polanski shot and edited it beautifully, both in terms of cinematography and by keeping the storyline full of suspense. But there are some very silly plot turns which I felt came about because of the fall-out between Robert Harris and the Blairs – petty rather than substantive. It is quite a way to get revenge on old friends who you’ve fallen out with to write a novel and have that novel turned into a movie. But I guess it does make an interesting work of fiction – a fiction which some people might find it hard to resist believing is true. I’m managing to resist though!
Go and watch The Ghost, it won’t blow your mind, but it will certainly entertain the political junky in you. The connection with Tony Blair is also fascinating, although more amusing through Polanski’s and Harris’ eyes, and through Brosnan’s acting.
If this film has only one affect, it will be to improve sales of Tony Blair’s memoirs which are to be released worldwide this September!