The Quiet American

Based on the seminal novel by Graham Greene, The Quiet American opens in Saigon in 1952, as the Vietnamese struggle for independence from the French gathers pace. Thomas Fowler (a remarkably assured Michael Caine) is a British journalist, who is living a fairly quiet life with his beautiful mistress Phuong (Yen). That all changes when an idealistic American aid worker, Thomas Pyle (Brendan Fraser) befriends Fowler and immediately falls in love with Phuong.

The Quiet American has been made into a film once before (1958), but Philip Noyce's version will certainly not suffer in comparison. An intelligent, meditative study of both love and suffering, The Quiet American is assured and thought provoking stuff. With Caine in career best form (and surely a certain Oscar nominee), the only real problem with The Quiet American is that the film could have done with another thirty minutes, primarily to further explore the ambiguous character of Pyle. It's a small complaint, for The Quiet American is a vivid, rich and deeply atmospheric movie.