Movie review: 'Traitor' isn't worth the effort

Don Cheadle is a good enough actor that he almost pulls his new film "Traitor" out of the post summer doldrums.

It's always a gamble to create an artistic work based on the flighty moments of the current day, and "Traitor" is another post-Sept. 11 film trying to explain the current ways of the day. I don't think it succeeds, even though it's probably the best of the Sept. 11 films so far.

The film begins with a quick flashback of Samir Horn (Cheadle) watching his father die in a Mideast terrorist attack, and then just as quick we are witnessing Samir making a sale of explosives to a terrorist cell. Samir speaks English and Arabic and presents himself as a world-weary arms dealer selling to any buyer. After the arms deal goes bad and everyone is thrown into a Yemen prison, we find out that Samir grew up mostly in the U.S. and has a complicated past. The FBI offers him a deal to escape prosecution, but Samir won't have it.

After a lengthy, and derivative, prison sequence where we learn that Samir is a true believer of the Muslim faith, he falls in with the terrorist cell to which he originally sold explosives.

A planned escape from the prison finds Samir and his cell in Paris planning a widespread attack on America that would have tragic consequences. As he and his group move ahead, the FBI gets closer and closer to Samir. Will Samir succeed? Will the FBI succeed? Who is the bad guy, anyway? Hints abound throughout the film that what you see might not be the real story.

Whether the audience cares enough to look for the hints is another story.

The idea of opening a film around a MacGuffin is always a bit tricky. To complicate the real story is quite often a success when the story, as it plays out, is exciting and enjoyable — just make sure the payoff is worth the trip. I don't believe "Traitor" is worth the trip.

As I said at the top, Don Cheadle is a good actor, but something was missing here. His low-key performance ill-served the film. Though I'm sure it was a deliberate decision, the effect brought a somewhat uninterested haze over the film. It was clearly a misstep.

This exciting plot line and the current high intensity of the war on terror seemed to be played as if it was already old hat. In some ways it reminded me of the "war on drugs" films where burned out cops are chasing sophisticated drug dealers, and both sides don't really have a passion for anything.