Black Bag is good—clean, confident, and technically sound—but it doesn’t quite rise to the level of Soderbergh’s best recent work. What plays out in the film is less Mission: Impossible and more an anxious domestic drama cloaked in the sharp suits and icy exteriors of the spy genre. Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett star as a couple with their relationship put to the ultimate stress test.
‘Black Bag’ Movie Review
Steven Soderbergh remains one of the most relentlessly productive filmmakers in Hollywood, and Black Bag (2025) is the latest testament to both his prolific output and his clinical precision as a director. Just a few months removed from his genre-blurring POV horror experiment Presence, Soderbergh returns with a twisty, espionage-laced thriller that plays like a stripped-down puzzle box: sleek, controlled, and occasionally a bit too chilly for its own good.
Black Bag follows George (Michael Fassbender), a man who finds his life and marriage unraveling when his wife Kathryn (Cate Blanchett)—an intelligence officer—is named one of five agents suspected of stealing a top-secret weapon and attempting to sell it to Russia. The couple, once composed and unshakably calm, begins to fracture as paranoia sets in and trust erodes. What plays out is less Mission: Impossible and more an anxious domestic drama cloaked in the sharp suits and icy exteriors of the spy genre.
Fassbender’s performance is all quiet tension and emotional shutdown, while Blanchett delivers her lines with cool control and razor-sharp subtlety. On their own, both are strong; together, they make for a pair that feels intentionally stiff, but that iciness translates to the film as a whole. There’s a sense that the emotional core never quite comes into focus, leaving Black Bag more impressive than affecting. The tension is ever-present, but it often feels more cerebral than visceral.
That disconnect might stem from the pairing of material and director. Soderbergh’s collaboration with screenwriter David Koepp (who also wrote Kimi and Presence) brings another tight, propulsive script full of insider jargon, clipped dialogue, and a brisk narrative rhythm. At just 94 minutes, the film flies by, and there’s an undeniable satisfaction to watching Soderbergh’s formalist style keep the gears turning smoothly. But Black Bag feels slightly mismatched with his temperament as a filmmaker—its shadowy spy game plotting craves more heat and messiness than his ever-refined compositions allow.
Still, there’s plenty to admire here. Soderbergh’s visual language is efficient and clean, recalling his recent work on The Laundromat, High Flying Bird, and Magic Mike’s Last Dance. You may not always be able to freeze a frame and call it “Soderberghian,” but the way scenes are composed, paced, and assembled feels uniquely his. Few directors have this strong a grasp on the medium’s formal mechanics, and even fewer can adapt that skill across so many genres this fluidly.
The supporting cast adds texture, if not standout moments. Tom Burke (Furiosa) and Marisa Abela (Back to Black) play a couple within the intelligence community, both caught up in the same cloud of suspicion. Naomie Harris brings a grounded professionalism as an internal psychologist for the team, though her role is somewhat underwritten. The standout among the ensemble is Regé-Jean Page, whose layered performance adds depth to a character that could have easily been another cipher in the espionage machine. Page, who previously starred in The Gray Man, gets far more nuance to work with here and makes the most of it.
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In the end, Black Bag is good—clean, confident, and technically sound—but it doesn’t quite rise to the level of Soderbergh’s best recent work. It lacks the emotional immediacy of Kimi or the stylish momentum of Out of Sight. And while it’s nice to see a star-powered, auteur-driven thriller making waves in theaters, the buzz feels less about the film itself and more about the general state of cinema in early 2025.
Still, if you’re a Soderbergh fan or a lover of sleek spy dramas, Black Bag delivers a solid, cerebral ride. Just don’t expect it to linger much longer than its tightly packed runtime.
Score: 6/10
Black Bag (2025)
- Cast: Cate Blanchett, Michael Fassbender, Marisa Abela, Tom Burke, Naomie Harris, Regé-Jean Page, Pierce Brosnan
- Director: Steven Soderbergh
- Genre: Drama, Mystery, Thriller
- Runtime: 94 minutes
- Rated: R
- Release Date: March 14, 2025
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