My sister and I went to see Traitor on a whim yesterday. It stars Don Cheadle as a devout Muslim Sudanese-American who falls in with a Islamic terrorist group and features Guy Pearce as the FBI agent trying to track him down. Since we went in low expectations, my sister and I were both pleased to discover that the movie was well-acted, well-paced and had a lot of neat twists and turns, not all of which we saw coming. I certainly prefer this kind of intelligent, plot-driven action film to the big, blow-'em-up blockbusters which treat plot as an optional ingredient. It makes the viewer feel as if they've seen something interesting and slightly thought provoking rather than induce motion sickness. I wish more action films would similarly focus on entertaining the audience with a nicely laid out story rather than a large bang.
I also have to note the performance of Saïd Taghmaoui, a French-Morrocan actor who was very interested as Cheadle's terrorist buddy and who I have enjoyed in a number of previous films, particularly his turn as an Iraqi national guard in Three Kings (a great Iraq film). Since he has routinely been stuck with the terrorist-type roles, I'm hoping there's something different on his horizon - today's news is that Lost has cast him for Season 5!
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