The Statement review

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Pierre Brossard (Michael Caine) is a Nazi collaborator, forced on thelam when a feisty Parisian judge (Tilda Swinton) teams up with a French army colonel (Jeremy Northam) to bring him to justice. But there's more: Brossard, a self-pitying religious zealot, has been hidden and supported by the Catholic church for decades, part of a nationwide conspiracy to protect the unsavoury pasts of government bigwigs...

One thing's for sure: Michael Caine is not the first name to spring to mind when casting a French Nazi. And, sure enough, his apples-and-pears pronunciation sticks in the craw, a hard-to-ignore smudge on an otherwise pristine performance. Still, at least he's not alone, a variety of English thesps playing Franco roles for no apparent reason.

Get past the bizarre casting and whiff of Euro-pudding, however, and Norman Jewison's political thriller plays like a classy episode of Bergerac, replete with tantalising moral core. Which, as praise goes, is hardly irresistible.

The Total Film team are made up of the finest minds in all of film journalism. They are: Editor Jane Crowther, Deputy Editor Matt Maytum, Reviews Ed Matthew Leyland, News Editor Jordan Farley, and Online Editor Emily Murray. Expect exclusive news, reviews, features, and more from the team behind the smarter movie magazine.