THE DEBT is an American adaptation of a 2007 Israeli film Ha-Hov in which the celebrations of a seemingly heroic past sit uncomfortably with Rachel Singer, HELEN MIRREN, as her journalist daughter lauches a book about her exploits as a Mossad agent in Berlin in the 1960's. In the flashbacks, where she's played by JESSICA CHASTAIN, she had been sent as part of a team comprising David, SAM WORTHINGTON and Stephan, MARTON CSOKAS, to entrap the notorious Butcher of Birkenau, Dieter Vogel, JESPER CHRISTENSEN,and return with him to Israel to stand trial. Vogel is now practicing as an obstetrician under another name. The tensions between the three young people are exacerbated by their personal relationships.

This is a truly tense thriller, particularly in the early scenes in Berlin. Director John Madden who made SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE has elicited really fine performances from his young cast and from HELEN MIRREN, TOM WILKINSON who plays the older Stephan and CIARON HINDS as the troubled David. The moral dilemmas posed by events in the past impacting on the present are dealt with rather superficially, but THE DEBT is really solid entertainment.

At The Movies
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Truth, lies and consequences are the ingredients of this edge-of-seat espionage thriller on whose coattails tug issues of guilt, conscience and morality. Based on the 2007 Israeli film Ha Hov, it's an international story shot in Hungary, Israel and England, skilfully told by a talented team: Oscar-nominated director John Madden, script-writers Matthew Vaughn, Jane Goldman and Peter Straughan plus a superlative cast headed by Helen Mirren in top form.

The story plays out like a puzzle in which pieces are added one at a time until we understand the ramification of every revelation. If you like your spy thrillers tense, gripping and meaningful, The Debt should be on the top of your must-see list.

It is Tel Aviv in 1997 and the sudden death of retired Mossad agent David (Hinds) comes as a shock to his former secret agent partners Rachel (Mirren) and Stephan (Wilkinson), triggering a backward glance at the mission that brought them together in 1966: the hunt in East Berlin for Nazi war criminal Dieter Vogel (Christensen), the feared Surgeon of Birkenau. David's death coincides with the publication of a book by Rachel's daughter Sarah (Romi Aboulifa), that relates the success of the mission over 30 years earlier and in particular her mother's role, in capturing Vogel and killing him while trying to escape.

The intrigue begins with a series of events that flicker back and forth in two time frames. The film's opening scene in which we meet the three young Mossad agents symbolically shows their profile in shadow. There is a huge shadow over their lives as we are about to discover.

When Rachel is asked to read an excerpt from her daughter's newly launched book about her top-secret war exploits, the selected chapter recalls New Year's Eve in Berlin, when life changed forever for the then-young Rachel (Chastain), David (Worthington) and Stefan (Csokas). The mood is tense and the Surgeon of Birkenau is their prisoner in the claustrophobic, dark apartment. We cannot h

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