Allied (2016), R, ★★

Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard.

Brad Pitt is killing Nazis...for the third time again? All right. Well...there have been a lot of news surrounding Brad Pitt's personal life and his marriage with Angelina Jolie due to the rumored relationship with Marion Cotillard. It was proven false because Cotillard is in a relationship with his boyfriend and are also expecting their second child. So, it was unfortunately the false promotion going on with this movie instead of this movie is the next project by director Robert Zemeckis who has made stories with such wondrous visual effects. Even though there is notice in its spectacle, the story drags with its predictability in its main storyline despite the fact that Zemeckis is trying to go for an old-fashioned love story. As an action and suspenseful film, it works. As a love story, not as much.

In the French Morocco in 1942, Max Vatan (Brad Pitt) is an intelligence officer that has descended into the desert with the information that he will be meeting a person in a dress and to "look for the hummingbird". He is taken to a club in Casablanca where he meets Marianne Beausejour (Marion Cotillard), the woman he was supposed to meet. They pose as husband and wife as she critiques Max's Parisian accent. They are both set on a mission to kill the Nazi ambassador and to convince him (August Diehl) to be a believable couple. After a shootout, Max and Marianne hide in a car having sex in the middle of the sandstorm.

Later, after they have completed their mission, World War II starts to loom as an air raid falls over London where they are living as Marianne is in labor giving birth to a girl named Anna with Max on her side. After a year, Max and Marianne have grown accustomed to being a family until Max is being called in by his commanding officer, Frank Heslop (Jared Harris) and an S.O.E. official (Simon McBurney). He reveals that Marianne is a German spy (it's not a spoiler because it's in the trailers and TV commercials) and Max has to kill her or he will be committing treason. Max thinks it is ridiculous but he is set to find out the truth regarding Marianne's identity.

Busted!

I was disappointed by this movie because its set-up is quite intriguing as the first half of the film is solid as the movie is transpired into a WWII version of Mr. and Mrs. Smith and it was kind of awesome. The action sold me as they are people trying to do their job but once the love story begins, it becomes flat. There is not as much sultriness as I once was led to believe based on the trailers but there is not as much romantic connection as their lives are in peril for most of the time. When it gets to the investigation, the movie slows heavily and it becomes pandering because we, the audience, already have figured the revelation out but Pitt's character takes a little too much to further out the truth. I wished that the filmmakers and writers were more aggressive with that revelation.

Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard, especially the latter, give solid performances individually. Pitt, somehow, does not quite work with Cotillard as he is more uninteresting and too laid back or forced when he is communicating with her and other people on-screen. I think this is one of the rarest bad performances from him. Cotillard, however, is radiant, seductive and vulnerable as her character provides such suspense that puts curious tantalization in its script. But, there is no spark in the old-fashioned epic romance like Hollywood did in the 1950s. The prime example is that there is not much build-up to the real romance in the sandstorm except that is was "necessary" to have a love scene in the middle of the sandstorm.

Director Robert Zemeckis specializes in visual effects and great camera shots. But, this time, his visual effects are more noticeably glossy and a bit fake in the background as it causes a distraction in a few scenes. There are great moments such as the scene in the hospital where Marianne had to give birth during an air raid, even though it is debatably laughable, and also the action sequences in the first 30 minutes. Maybe, the problem is that I could not root for these characters as they were not as complicated or emotionally connected. I felt like the actors were confused throughout the entire film to probably interpret whether if its an old epic love story, a war film, a thriller with romantic subplots, etc. I did not feel much magic or artistic nor emotional brilliance in this story as I got from Zemeckis' other works.

**