Search - A Different Loyalty on DVD

Nina E.
Reviewed on 7/30/2011...

I love a good spy. espionage movie. This is it !! this is a very sexy movie...there is steamy chemistry between Rupert and Sharon...I've always been impressed at Rupert's ability to star as a leading man and a heterosexual...obvious to me...Sharon Stone makes this possible..If you were not aware that Rupert came out in 1989...he was ridiculed for it...you'd never guess...personally I love seeing him at a heterosexual..ladies it's our loss...to all the men...the is a man's movie...I happen to love the testosterone. This movie is staying in my collection.

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Based on History

Swanee | 02/06/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I found this a fascinating movie. It's based, of course, on the real life events of the Cambridge spies, particularly the most famous of them, Kim Philby. For some reason, they changed all the names of the spies in the movie. I don't know why they changed the names; I thought it would have been more effective if they had not.

Anyway, the film focuses on the life of Philby (a different name in the movie) and the wife he marries in Beirut. Philby famously left MI5 and took up the job of a journalist in Beirut from which position he presumably continued his work for the KGB. Upon discovering that he was about to be outted, he fled for Moscow, leaving his ignorant wife in the lurch. She at first was in denial, then travelled to Moscow and discovered the truth about her husband. In the end she separates from him, even though still being in love.

The movie portrays most Americans as boors of course. Philby is portrayed mostly sympathetically throughout despite his traitourous activities in real life (passing nuclear secrets to the Reds thereby prolonging the Cold War). However, I found the pace of the movie and the depth of character portrayal quite engrossing. Glad to have stumbled across it."

3.5 stars for Sharon Stone's multidimensional portrait and u

Larry VanDeSande | Mason, Michigan United States | 04/30/2007

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Based in part on the lives of Eleanor Philby and British spy Kim Philby (1912-1988), "A Different Loyalty" is an odd and partially successful mixture of spy novel, history, and romance.

Rupert Everett plays Leo Cauffiled (the metaphor for Kim Philby, who was said to be among the most successful double agents of the Cold War) and Stone plays wife Sally. The story begins in Beirut where the pair meet, romance, Sally divorces her diplomat husband, and the pair marry. They enjoy happiness until Leo defects.

When Sally discovers Leo has been a double agent working for the Russians, she ignores the advice of American authorities and joins him in Moscow. The film takes mostly dark and ill turns afterward, and the ending is neither preidctable, satisfying, nor pleasant. The postlude indicates Leo stayed a Soviet until his death in 1988.

This movie is a lot like a made for TV flick in its first hour. Many of the events played out over time -- such as Sally's attraction to Leo and her subsequent affair with him, then leaving her husband to marry him -- transpire in only 1-2 scenes of only a couple minutes' duration. This is one of the film's great weaknesses -- its superficial presentation of the lives of its main subjects.

The great strength in Stone's multidimensional performance as wife, sexpot, mistress, mother, ex-wife, searcher, and household beacon. She is completely credible in every role and creates empathy for her tortured persona as she first searches for her wayward husband, then finds him, then is tormented by his decision to choose Communism over wife, family, freedom and Western material largess.

The movie was filmed in New York, London, Montreal, Moscow and Malta, a Meditteranes nation off Sicily that must have been the site for the scenes in Beirut. There is no question that -- while the cinematography could easily have been more widescale and enjoyable -- the scenes in Malta and Moscow were particularly fine. The site filming added authenticity to the overall project.

Still, there are enough holes in the plot and superficiality to the story to keep this from being in the top rank. It is above average for its colluded storyline and Stone's wonderful performance. Anyone that likes spy films or romance will enjoy "A Different Loyalty"."

A Different 'Truthiness' (Three-and-a-Half Stars)

F. S. L'hoir | Irvine, CA | 01/01/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

""A Different Loyalty" may have been well intentioned, but it disappoints on two levels. For those who do not know that the plot has been lifted (without attribution) from Eleanor Philby's memoir, "The Spy I Married," it is a rather humdrum, albeit entertaining and well-acted, romance with an espionage background (although I seem to have missed the dead bodies referred to by one of the reviewers; and the DVD cover is egregiously misrepresentative, depicting the main character [played by Rupert Everett], gun in hand, running from an exploding truck and hovering helicopters--something that Kim Philby [the ultimate bureaucrat] never did in his life [and, unless it has been cut from the movie, neither did Everett.]). For those who do know the historical background, the film is infuriating. Even though the names of Philby, Burgess, and Maclean, et al, have been inexplicably changed (after 40-plus years), the script follows Eleanor's account carefully, making numerous allusions to actual events in Philby's life and career; towards the end, however, it suddenly veers off into fantasy land as the wife, Sally (the Eleanor surrogate), with the connivance of British Intelligence, tries to persuade her husband, Leo (the Kim Philby avatar), to return to London to testify (probably the last thing that the British government wanted at the time).

The film, nevertheless, is lovely to look at, with the photogenic island of Malta standing in for Beirut of the 1960s, and the surprisingly photogenic city of Moscow standing in for itself. The acting is more than creditable; the children are especially good, as is the smarmy double-dealing SIS agent. Sharon Stone, who, with dark hair, bears a remarkable resemblance to Eleanor Philby, is believable. I was, however, left rather cold by Rupert Everett in the role of the hero (or anti-hero), even though I thought he was brilliant in "Another Country" as the arrogantly handsome Guy Bennett (read Burgess). With his perpetual well-bred sneer, Everett simply does not exude the infamous Philby charm!"