4-25-05, 9:00 am

The Interpreter

A United Nations interpreter, Silvia Bloome (Nicole Kidman) accidentally overhears part of a plot to assasinate the leader of Matobo, a fictitious African country, when he will be giving a speech to the General Assembly of the UN in a few days. She is discovered by the would-be assassins and becomes the center of a frenzied attempt to discover who is behind the plot, which also seems somehow directly related to uncovering the truth about her past.

Leading the chase is Tobin Keller (Sean Penn), a Secret Service agent whose estranged wife was recently killed in an automobile accident. Keller and his team quickly learn that the target of the assassination attempt, Edmond Zuwanie (Earl Cameron), formerly regarded as a heroic leader of his nation's struggle for independence, has turned to political repression and mass killings to maintain a stranglehold on power, using the claim that his political enemies are terrorists as cover. Just weeks ago, in real life, the US abstained from voting on a UN Security Council resolution to refer to the ICC allegations of ethnic cleansing and mass killings by government-backed militia in the Sudan. The administration preferred to try to weaken the authority of the court rather than ensure that justice for the as many as 400,000 people killed in the Sudan could be found.

The film's slaps at the unilateralism and inherently violent policies of the US administration aren't the centerpiece of the film, however. This film is a thoughtful and fast-paced political thriller that will keep you in your seat.

But at its heart, this film is about learning to distinguish between vengeance and justice. While the desire for vengeance is a real human emotional response to grief, the act itself is too often a key part of the cycle of violence, terror, and death that prevents us from achieving justice.

Justice, on the other hand, has at its heart, forgiveness and reconciliation, equally real and valid human responses to grief. This view of justice does not mean that criminals remain unpunished, but that our morality, dignity, humanity along with peace remain possible. Cycles of violence are made inevitable by human action, they aren't inherently so.



--Clara West can be reached at pa-letters@politicalaffairs.net.