The Whistleblower

Editorial

This first feature from director Larysa Kondracki lifts the lid on an oft-overlooked truth: given the chance, Rachel Weisz can be a fantastic actress. Everyone should see this, just so Weisz is known as "The one in The Whistleblower", rather than "The one in The Mummy".

As UN employee Kathryn, who embarks upon a one-woman crusade against systemic corruption, Weisz is even more emphatic than in her The Constant Gardener Oscar-winning role. It's impossible to forego emotional involvement with Kathryn's efforts to gather evidence about her colleagues' part in the sex-trafficking industry she stumbles across, or avoid sharing her frustration when very few people — Redgrave's minor but noteworthy character aside — care.

As you'd expect, there are plenty of "Who can I really trust?" moments in The Whistleblower, as well as the obligatory map-with-photos-linked-by-string-and-drawing-pins wall mount that any good movie-based investigation entails. But the authenticity of the story (Kondracki and co-writer Kirwan spent two years researching in Europe) and the genuinely distressing nature of some of the scenes override any lingering cliché and make for a highly provocative achievement.

Dan Poole