BRAD Pitt (“World War Z”) is an intelligence officer during World War II in the mystery thriller “Allied.” This is the second time for Pitt to venture into a war-time setting, after serving as a tank commander in David Ayer’s brilliant film, “Fury” in 2014, but this time, he has nowhere to turn.
Pitt plays Max Vatan, an Allied spy—or intelligence officer—who is stationed in Casablanca, Morocco, where the Nazis have overrun many of the landmark cities and are setting their sights on sweeping through to the Suez Canal. There, Vatan encounters the incredibly beautiful Marianne Beausejour (played by Marion Cotillard), a French Resistance fighter.
There, the two serve on a deadly mission: killing as many Nazis as possible as she hides him in her house as her “husband.” Everyone around are listening in and watching the two pretend to be in love and are just swift and cunning enough behind enemy lines to survive.
It is the barren desert—far away from the world at war, where both Vatan and Beausejour can feel the natural heat they share. Making love in the front seat of your car during a sandstorm is just one example of the passion they have for one another until the war itself, quite physically, pulls them apart.
Later reunited in London, their relationship moves into marriage and they have a baby girl.
Quickly then everything falls apart by suspicion and doubt.
It begs this question: What if your spouse (or significant other) was not who s/he says they are?
Marion Cotillard (Marianne Beausejour) and Brad Pitt (Max Vatan) in a scene from “Allied”
What if they are secretly having an adulterous affair?
Or in this case, what if Marianne, the woman Pitt’s Vatan has given his heart and soul to, is really a double agent working for the Nazis and is playing him like a fool to “feed” him disinformation and ultimately kill him if her mission fails?
I think that is spookier than a dozen zombies coming to eat your face.
There is nothing more sacred than to give your heart to someone else. But what if that someone else was listening in on every
conversation you were having, writing it down and sending along reports to their superiors? For money.
Cotillard’s steaming onscreen role is also made so much more visual as it was the real life “cause célèbre” accusations of adultery leveled by Angelina Jolie in her divorce from Pitt during the filming of “Allied.”
Cotillard, who was pregnant at the time of filming, denied the rumors, as did Pitt. However, seeing these two on the screen together, you might just believe Jolie.
Just like in “Mr. & Mrs. Smith” where Pitt and Joie were amazing, this new coupling will have you immediately forgetting that previous union ever happened.
Pitt is a true movie star. He looks great and is passionate about the roles he takes. So is Cotillard. When Vatan returns home one night to his lovely paramour, tired, confused and in a daze when his superiors reveal that his lover is really a double agent, she greets him with great affection. And a butcher knife behind her back.
Academy Award winning director Robert Zemeckis (“Who Framed Robert Rabbit”) never lets the screenplay by executive producer Steven Knight sway too from the really steamy on-set attraction of his main stars. Oh, of course the Nazis are never too far away from shooting, slamming and ramming Vatan six feet under.
What was most awkward to watch—given current events—are the equally hot sex scenes between Pitt and Cotillard. If her Marianne was not a double agent, then perhaps it was Jolie secretly in disguise and listening in from the room next door.
Jolie’s unseen presence hangs over this film like a dark cloud. The Nazis can’t hold a candle to Jolie’s unseen fury.
Although never seen, I truly expected her to burst into the bedroom with guns a blazing.
I can tell you, dear reader, that doesn’t happen, and as “Allied” moves into its final scenes, Vatan is beside himself as finally with his superiors demand that he kill Marianne within the next 72 hours—by his own hand before she can reveal the Allies’ most precious secrets to the enemy—or be hanged.
He has to clear her name and will do anything to do so.
Filmed on location in the Canary Island and London, “Allied” is a great mystery thriller and given current events, is a movie the now single Ms. Jolie hopes you will look upon with favor.
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