Coming attractions

Never pick a fight with someone who buys [virtual] ink by the barrel.

In theaters today is Breach, (trailer) described in the film's publicity as "Inspired by the true story of the greatest security breach in U.S. history."

It's the story of F.B.I. analyst Robert Hannsen, who was arrested in early 2001 after spying for the Soviet Union and Russia for more than 20 years. Hannsen is, to say the least, a complex and contradictory figure. He betrayed his country for money, sending others to their death, but he didn't seem to agree with or even like the Soviets he conspired with.

He was also a devout Roman Catholic. Old school devout. He belonged to Opus Dei, marched in anti-abortion rallies, sent his six kids to Catholic schools, and went to mass more than once a week.

If you're telling Hannsen's story, you've got to deal with that strange contrast of faith and treason. Was his faith just a completely compartmentalized separate category (and therefore an ultimately irrelevant and impotent thing)? Or was his intense devotion a kind of penance that Hannsen imagined could balance the scales against his lethal greed and betrayals? Or maybe there was something pernicious about his particular variety of fervent, reactionary religiosity, something that fed and enabled his misdeeds.

Whichever the case, that religiosity — his devoutly conservative, William-Donohue-ish Catholicism — is central and unavoidable in telling Robert Hannsen's story. So no matter how the movie addresses it, no matter how the always excellent Chris Cooper chooses to portray it, Breach is likely to drive the already rage-addled Donohue even further into madness. And that makes me happy.

So I give Breach an enthusiastic thumbs-up. (No, I haven't seen it yet, but after all, Donohue has made a career out of commenting on movies he hasn't seen.)