Movie Review – Black Bag

Director: Steven Soderbergh
Starring: Cate Blanchett, Michael Fassbender, Marisa Tomei, Tom Hardy
Year: 2025

Soderbergh is incapable of being boring. The man makes like three movies a year and somehow they’re all at least interesting. Not always great. But always interesting.

Black Bag is a spy thriller. Sort of. It’s set in the intelligence world but it’s really more of a paranoid chamber drama. Cate Blanchett plays an intelligence officer whose husband — also an intelligence officer, played by Michael Fassbender — might be a traitor. Or she might be. Or they both might be. Or neither. The movie keeps you guessing.

It’s talky. Like really talky. There are long scenes of people in rooms explaining things to each other and then explaining why the things they just explained might be lies. If you’re looking for action this isn’t that. There’s maybe one sequence that could be called an action scene and it lasts about two minutes.

But god the acting. Blanchett and Fassbender are doing this dance where every glance means something and you’re never sure who’s playing who. There’s a dinner party scene early on that’s like watching a chess match except the pieces are all trying to kill each other. The dialogue is sharp in that Aaron Sorkin-adjacent way where everyone is too witty but you don’t care because it sounds good.

Soderbergh shot this himself as usual — under the name Peter Andrews because he thinks it’s funny — and the look is that cold digital aesthetic he’s been doing lately. Blue-grey color palette. Lots of close-ups. Shallow focus so the background is always slightly threatening and unclear. It fits the material.

The supporting cast is stacked. Marisa Tomei plays Blanchett’s handler. Tom Hardy shows up as a character I won’t spoil but his scenes are electric. Pierce Brosnan has a small role that’s basically him winking at his Bond past. Regé-Jean Page is here too doing mysterious British guy things.

My issues. The plot is convoluted in a way that I think is intentional but occasionally frustrating. There’s a twist near the end that I’m still not sure I understood. And the ending is. Ambiguous. Which I usually like but here it felt less like artistic ambiguity and more like they couldn’t figure out how to resolve everything.

But these are minor complaints. Black Bag is a smart adult thriller at a time when those barely exist. It assumes you’re paying attention. It rewards close watching. It trusts actors to carry scenes without explosions or spectacle.

Soderbergh doing Soderbergh things. Making movies for adults about adults doing adult things.

It’s not his best work. But his average is better than most directors’ peaks.

My rating: ★★★★☆

Black Bag on IMDb | Black Bag on Rotten Tomatoes