The Angel is based on a true story about Ashraf Marwan, the son in law of Egyptian president Nasser who worked in high levels of the Egyptian government and was reportedly a spy feeding information to Israel. Today both Israel and Egypt claim he was spying for them. There is a delicious real world mystery here which could have been explored. I kept imagining a film which played with our expectations, giving us glimpses into a mysterious man we could never truly know or trust, never confirming exactly what his motivations were, setting us to have to determine what we believe.
But The Angel doesn't go there. It sets out exactly who their Marwan is. In the Angel he's a western obsessed family man who meets all our traditional tests of what a good man is. The Angel leaves no ambiguity or mystery. He's caught in the grip of history and acts heroically. This very well could have been the real Marwan. But we don't really know. The film needs us to see him in this light.
Because the film also keeps dropping its not subtle supports for western status quo values such as capitalism, individualism, zionism. Again, not debating any of that in this review, just pointing out the movie, which had an opportunity to present a fascinatingly labyrinthine puzzle, an enigma to decipher, but instead the film makes its very concrete case and tells more of a traditional hero story.
For me this was rather boring. I get this is the story Vromen wanted to tell. Good for him. It just did little to nothing to excite me. The story just felt very common. And I kept thinking of what it could have been.
The Angel
Starring: Marwan Kenzari, Toby Kebbell, Hannah Ware
Director: Ariel Vromen
Writer: David Arata
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