It's fascinating to note how reviews of this film -- and many others -- seem to fall along political lines.<br /><br />Some who commented on this film and who liked it, happily saw a pro-UN message in Pollack's effort. (Many of these appear to be non-Americans.) American have tended to judge the film for its story-telling qualities which are sadly lacking.) Unfortunately for Pollack, his masterpiece work "Three Days of the Condor" is a terribly hard act for anyone to follow, especially for its director who is competing with himself in this genre. "The Interpreter" does not fare well in this comparison.<br /><br />What was going on in this film? Sean Penn is a federal agent with an improbable and bizarre personal life (his dancer spouse is a runaway wife who dies in a car wreck with her lover...?) There there is all sorts of halting, non sequitur dialogue between Penn and Kidman that seems to hint at a romantic development but goes nowhere.<br /><br />The plot turns were all contrived and some of the action was incomprehensible -- why didn't the agents get off the bus when told to? Why did they keep saying they didn't want to expose their cover until they were blown to bits? It was one of many inexplicably odd plot devices that were counterintuitive. Much of this film was so contradictory it nearly gave me a headache.<br /><br />Movies are fiction, sleight of hand and fantasy but they have to be believable within their own context. "Condor" was brilliant in that it was believable within itself. Robert Redford was a thoroughly believable CIA analyst with a background that allowed him to elude assassination while developing a believable relationship with Faye Dunaway whom he kidnapped at random to aid his escape.<br /><br />I'll simply fast-forward to the "The Interpreter's" outrageously unrealistic ending which I will not reveal. I'll simply ask viewers to compare it to the delicious twist at the end of "Condor" in which Redford is given fatherly advice by his own would-be assassin after the killer was instead ordered to murder the man who wanted Redford dead.<br /><br />"Condor" had a hard and realistic edge to it that is missing in "Interpreter".<br /><br />As for the political message of "Interpreter" regarding the UN, it seems one could see the film as arguing for and against the trouble-plagued international body. As a political message, Pollack's film seems as confused as its plot.