The Human Factor (1979)

Now director Otto Preminger's later films have a reputation of being not good, now its a little hard for me to independently verify this as most of the movies Preminger made in his last working decade have not been released on DVD, and are thus hard to come by. I can generally agree however that I find his later films, says those made 1965 and after, like Skidoo and Bunny Lake is Missing, to lack the gravitas of his great movies like Anatomy of a Murder and Advise and Consent. Preminger's last film however, The Human Factor, showed the man very much back on his game. Now this film had a very small budget, and thus has a look far from that of the epic drama's of the directors heyday of the late 50's and early 60's, but like many of Preminger's early films it can boast strong performances and is thrilling as human drama.

Based on author Graham Greene's same titled novel of the previous year, The Human Factor is a sort of spy movie by way of human interest story. It tells how Marcus Castle (played expertly by the sadly under-known Nicole Williamson) an otherwise loyal mid-level member of the British intelligence service became a Soviet Spy. The movie starts out with British intelligence, by way of its own double-agent in Moscow, having becomes aware of a leak in its Africa section, and sending one  Colonel Daintry (Richard Attenborough) in to investigate. The film follows mostly along a contemporary narrative and then revels, by way of a couple of long flashback's, how Castle came to aid the Soviets following a series of disillusioning incidents while on assignment in South Africa around eight years prior.

The film is thus mostly a character study of Castle, and Williamson imparts to his character an appropriate level of depth, but never makes him more then what he is, a moderately capable, kind of soft hatred guy, who gets in a situation beyond his ability and not to his liking. Castle is a character who at one point tells his Soviet contact pointedly that he is not a communist, doesn't want to defect, but may have to. All of these events which are ultimately set in motion by Castle's desire to be with the black African woman he has fallen in love with, and who also loves him, may ironically result in his never being with her again. The film is made more pungent by a nice twist of a dramatic topper at the end that reframes everything you've seen before in a new light.

The movie loaded with good character actors like Derek Jacobi and Robert Morley who provide brief tastes of interesting subplots and make the world of the movie all the more rounded, and tragically ironic. In The Human Factor everyone is a real or potential traitor, which just serves to lend the proceedings a lite flavor of the tragically Kafkaesque. ***