Director John Crowley is not worried about members of the British government, even those in intelligence fields, seeing his new movie, “Closed Circuit.” The legal thriller doesn’t exactly paint MI5 in the best of lights, but Crowley told us that said branch of the government “Tend to maintain a bemused silence about any fictional representations.”
While there are, as Crowley states, fictional aspects of this movie, he also told us that members of the British legal community who have seen it “Gave it the thumbs up in terms of credibility and also as a movie.” That is important as “Closed Circuit” deals with relatively recent changes to the British legal system, specifically the Special Advocate position that comes into play with terrorism trials (or any trial that deals with potentially secret information). The movie attempts to be realistic in its depiction of legal proceedings, and Crowley seemed pleased that people in the know about the process in England accepted the movie.
As may be clear, the movie deals with terrorism and a terrorism trial. “Closed Circuit” opens by showing that explosion. Before the violence erupts though, the opening shot might remind one of the end of “Love Actually.” While we didn’t specifically bring up the rom-com in our discussion with Crowley, we did ask about his intent when using multiple camera shots at once (you can see what I’m talking about in the video above). He told us, “I didn’t want to open the film with a traditionally filmed explosion.” Crowley said he felt that going that route would be “wrong tonally” and that he wanted the audience to start to get the sense that maybe someone was watching the event unfold who should have been able to stop it. Not “Love Actually” at all.
“Closed Circuit” stars Rebecca Hall, Eric Bana, and Ciaran Hinds. It opens in theaters on Wednesday August 28.