This film has a really positive vibe about it and the 1933 atmosphere and attitudes are captured pretty authentically - you transported are there after just a couple of minutes.

It's essentially the story about friendship: it's the relationship between an idealistic doctor, an idealistic black lawyer and a beautiful idealistic artist.

It's a good old-fashioned mystery adventure: you wouldn't be surprised if you saw Indiana Jones walking past.

It's a political thriller: it deals with a very serious and historical incident back in '33 but handles it without taking itself too seriously - the result is a totally immersive, entertaining couple of hours. It's hard to believe that it's a two hour film because the time just flies by and this is one of those films which as you notice its running time is coming to an end, you're sad because you actually don't want it to end.

David O Russell has created a thoughtful, thoroughly engaging motion picture with rich, multi-layered characters who aren't just believable but characters you would like to know. Christian Bale is wonderfully eccentric without ever losing credibility or a sense of gravitas. It's rare to find a motion picture has so many well written characters with such real life personalities. They all have their own sense of fun but they're all just on this side of sensible and never silly or unbelievable.

The plot, which at some points seems secondary to getting to know the characters, is based loosely on an actual event and that's used as the basis of the original murder-mystery feel. The story is not complicated at all nevertheless exciting and keeps you guessing who are the good guys and who are the bad guys (subtle clue: the Nazis with the swastikas are the bad guys!) When everything is finally revealed towards the end you get that rare, warm feeling of satisfaction that you don't get too often in films these days where all the loose ends are tied up, everything makes sense.

And yes the MI5 agent really is Austin Powers.