The Constant Gardener (2005)

Directed by Fernando Meirelles. Starring Ralph Fiennes, Rachel Weisz, Danny Huston, Pete Postlethwaite, Archie Panjabi, Richard McCabe, Gerard McSorley, Bill Nighy, Tim Donohue, Hubert Koundé, Juliet Aubrey, Sidede Onyulo. [R]

After his young activist wife (Academy Award-winner Weisz) is murdered in Kenya, balmy diplomat Fiennes investigates the circumstances that led to her death and stumbles upon a conspiracy between his government and a pharmaceutical conglomerate that involves testing new drugs on poor villagers in Africa. Adapted by Jeffrey Caine from the John Le Carré novel of the same name (in turn, based on real-life incidents); beneath the gripping (if unsurprising) international thriller elements is a love story that seems to defy understanding, a glow that cannot be diminished but also cannot be parceled logically. Aggressive handheld close-ups suggest that director Meirelles didn’t have the confidence in the material’s intellectual urgency; the technique worked terrifically in his previous film (City of God), but it’s often overwrought here. A textured patchwork of present action and flashback (never jarring or confusing) and good performances, however, carry the day.

77/100