Ostensibly this is an example of excellence in film entertainment with leading actors, proven quality in all the technical areas and professional talent executed throughout. However, the certainty of this judgement doesn't fit with the experience of the film.

The film is pleasant visually but the story is a hackneyed piece of stale Cold War espionage - replete with Russkie accents straight out of Get Smart; that 1960s parody of all Cold War spy movies.

The movie pivots between sex, physical pain and some lengthy explanation to move onto the next phase in its structure. But even with an updated, more candid, sexual angle which is about as erotic as a week old fish in St Petersburg's Kuznechny Market, the pulse barely rises.

The rhythm of the narrative lurches between dull but necessary plot exposition/transition episodes through to the deliberate fulfillment of the plan. The plotting demands acceptance of the incredible, of the nearly miraculous strategic mental capabilities of the protagonist. The apparent complexity to the plot is intended to add layers of intrigue; hey, it's a spy movie after all, but it actually loads the finished product with reams of material that is a dead weight. Like so many movies of its ilk it has to deliver a trick, yet another twist, which may surprise and excite a goldfish, but otherwise looks strained, exhausted and unfulfilling.

The question arises whether the Russians ever made similar espionage movies and the answer is, they didn't. They didn't innovate and were still beating Nazis while Westerners were being made familiar with the tropes of this genre over 50 years ago. By now it is a certainty that some innovation is way past overdue in the West.