PASS THE POLY
By Joe Cooper
March 19, 2025
Soderbergh shows he’s still first in line for stitching style with wit in his new film Black Bag.
After the glow of fireworks cascaded over the evening gowns, tuxedos and velvet sofas of To Catch a Thief (1955), four of the powerhouses behind the film’s production would head to dinner along the coast of the South of France. Hitchcock, his wife Alma, Grace Kelly and Cary Grant enjoyed their summer shoot in style, tasting the good life and blurring the line between art and life. Heck, Grant wore his own clothes in the movie, which is to take nothing away from legendary costume designer Edith Head (whose credits also include Sabrina and Roman Holiday, both from 1953), who is still to this day the female Hollywood professional with the most Academy Awards.
One can imagine a similar tradition during the production of Black Bag, by veteran director Steven Soderbergh, who’s been delivering capers, thrillers and experiments in filmmaking since his groundbreaking indie Sex, Lies & Videotape (1989). The scene opens with a lavish dinner in a posh London townhouse, diffusely lit in a glow and glory of gold and mahogany. And he doesn’t wait to serve up many a delight, the first of which being a perfect cast of industry pros, none of which we’ve quite seen in the roles they play.
Michael Fassbender’s George is married to Cate Blanchett’s Kathryn, a glorious duo of cashmere and leather, playing a little game of “Get the guest” (for fans of Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?) with their four counterparts: a vibrant Naomie Harris as Dr. Zoe Vaughun, a comfortably sleek Regé-Jean Page as James, Marisa Abela as the sensually confident Clarissa, and, rounding out the sixsome, an always fabulous Tom Burke as Freddie, the resident cad, presumably happy to be indoors, with plenty of showers and suits, following his dusty and stoic turn as Praetorian Jack in Furiosa (2023). All work for the British government, and George has gathered them strategically to suss out that age old conundrum of the covert: there’s a mole in their midst.
The plot is basic and includes the regular stuff – malware, Russia – I’m sorry, I must have lost my place in this tumbler of brown liquor and the hazy amber light of custom interiors.
Who wins a game of cat and mouse, when all the mice are cats? Purr Soderbergh’s latest, it could be any of the six finely tailored bodies ready to pounce, chase tail and satisfyingly slink around a script so sensuous, it puts any recent mainstream mishmash to shame. David Koepp, screenwriting legend – Death Becomes Her (1992), Jurassic Park (1993), Mission: Impossible (1996), and most recently another Soderbergh collaboration, Presence (2024) – plays things much drier and drippier, suiting the English sensibility, opting for more of a chamber drama than a high stakes, globe trotting espionage thriller. One character calls another cold, and she responds, “Yes,” to which he retorts, “Christ, you’re even cold about being cold.” And he’s not above fun snippets of innuendo: George, the polygraph and lie detector expert within the organization, invites curiosity and flirtation from Abela’s Clarissa: “When you are going to poly me, George?” And, turns out, there’s plenty of poly to pass around.
Much has been buzzed about the film’s fashion, and rightly so. What a distinct pleasure, after we are all subjected to the new standard of everyday fashion, be it in the office, at the airport, or on the Subway, which is a look that appears to be “I was just fast asleep on a sofa in a house with no heat,” to enjoy some of the finest modern attire of today. Clothes that fit, the entire corpus covered, and worn well by people who actually care. Bless costume designer Ellen Mirojnik for her exceptional work here, building on her impressively immense lists of credits that includes Oppenheimer (2023) and Bridgerton (2020 and on). In addition to “carefully cut shirtings and haberdashery” as she explained to WWD, we are treated to the finest eyewear since Tom Ford’s A Single Man (2009).
Soderbergh has always been one of Hollywood’s arbiters of cool, or at least a documentarian of the styles of the moment. But he always keeps his cool cats grounded, like when Brad Pitt’s Rusty is seen in sleek suits, sprezzatura and all, but is always eating something slightly awkward, in 2001’s Ocean’s 11. Or when George Clooney, for whom it is genetically impossible to look anything but spectacular, bungles the time change in Ocean’s 12 (2004). Here, each one of our six lead characters make mistakes that trip them up, as bridges are built and burned deftly within the film’s 94 minute run time.
I for one had a much better time than in Fassbender’s other recent romp in spyland, David Fincher’s The Killer (2023), which tried hard to be quirky but was felled by plot holes and a dud ending. I like to imagine that perhaps his droid character, David, from Prometheus (2012), finally made it to Earth, took elocution lessons, got a tailor, and somehow seduced Cate Blanchett’s Cathryn. Both of these performers are among the best in our age, and can often be seen screaming, writhing in anguish, or generally falling apart in a range of unpleasant ways. Viewing them execute such restraint is like viewing a pair of gleaming samurai swords on a wall, deadly only when provoked, and otherwise very still, elegant and foreboding.
To be able to pull off this feat of combining an outstanding cast with a stylish look, an intriguing score and a simple plot might sound easy, but as Hitchcock showed us, it is often something only the masters can do well. Vertigo (1958) is as engaging for its technicolor costume changes as for its tale of mystery and obsession. North by Northwest (1959) is basically a Cary Grant fashion show, but with enough substance to land it in the AFI 100. Soderbergh’s Out of Sight (1998), though more comedic than most of Hitch, is just as stylish and sexy.
So poly your partner and pop out to catch this light, fun and sexy sextet. Fun and games never looked so good.