Martin Cruz Smith’s twisty/witty Moscow-set murder mystery/police procedural, a blast from the fin de CCCP past, gets a clear eyed, well-structured adaptation from helmer Michael Apted & scripter Dennis Potter. It’s a shame that so much of the local color and topsy-turvy capitalism vs communism doings get muddled via a babel of warring accents by the English speaking cast. If ever there was a time to use the old Hollywood convention of Russian accented English as a clarifying dramatic tool, this would be it. Nevertheless, it’s so well cast on it’s own terms (Lee Marvin, Ian Bannen, Brian Dennehy, Alexander Knox), plus some character stars of tomorrow (Ian McDiarmid, Richard Griffiths), that you can almost overlook William Hurt’s bad dye job & weird Mid-Atlantic speech patterns. Alas, you can’t ignore composer James Horner’s dated stylings on the soundtrack.
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