All the Old Knives

In the stirring narrative, Chris Pine plays ex-spy Henry Pelham who meets up with a former colleague and lover, Celia Harrison, portrayed brilliantly by the ...

Then it becomes all too clear that things are not what they seem, and one of these two may not survive the meal. After making sure everyone has clearance to receive this sensitive information, it should be stated that the truth can hurt sometimes. But can Netflix subscribers get in on all the secret agent action and suspense?

ALL THE OLD KNIVES is an intense political thriller with a relatively unusual framework. Eight years before the principal action, terrorists hijacked a ...

The script is taut, low-key and keeps us guessing until the end. The film is based on Olen Steinhauer’s source novel and screenplay. Beyond that, the less you know the more intense and suspenseful the viewing will be. Good work also from the makeup and wardrobe crews makes the casts’ ages look appropriately different for the two periods presented. The screenplay includes many flashbacks to the time of the tragedy, showing different perspectives and collateral relationships and transactions that may or may not prove who was culpable. The mystery comes from newly-discovered evidence that there may have been a mole in the CIA who contributed to that disastrous failure.

There's something old-fashioned about All the Old Knives, romance-cum-spy thriller starring Chris Pine and Thandiwe Newton.

Everything looks beautiful but the undercurrent is dark. Over the years, there have been hints about a mole inside the CIA who was involved. Increasingly, these mid-range movies (neither small indies nor tentpole blockbusters) are found on streaming services, as All the Old Knives is, in this case on Amazon Prime Video.

Chris Pine, Thandiwe Newton's spy thriller on Amazon Prime Video All The Old Knives is out now - read the ending explained to find out whodunnit.

At the table, a dying Henry tells her he loves her and demands Celia leave the restaurant, which she does. In the aftermath of being tortured by the Russians, he and his family fled to Iran where his daughter died, because they couldn't get medicine for her thanks to US sanctions. Celia reveals that after their asset was killed, she went back to Henry's place and while he was showering, she heard his phone vibrate and saw that an Iranian phone number was calling. Back in the past, they receive another message from their asset on board, who now says that the hijackers in fact have a camera on the undercarriage, and he tells them to abort their mission. Her suspicion is confirmed when, later, the plane door opens and their asset is shot in the head and dumped onto the tarmac. In the 'present day' Henry also visits Bill, threatening him to turn on who Henry suspects is the mole: Celia.

In “All the Old Knives,” ex-lovers and spies Henry and Celia meet for dinner in an upscale California beach town. They reminisce, haltingly, but this is no ...

There’s a self-seriousness in the way they’ve been directed (they bring a more methodical energy to the table than Thompson and Rickman did in “A Song for Lunch”) that tends to suck all the tension from their spy vs. And then there’s decision to make the hijackers Muslim, a tired, reductive narrative go-to the script does nothing to deepen or complicate. Events from the day of the hijacking arrive in flashback, taking us away from the restaurant — a lovely space that is empty of people and visual interest — but the change of scenery doesn’t enliven things between Pine and Newton, who are left to do little more than inject some intensity into these underdeveloped characters. The intimacy’s the thing and the film spotlights a pair of actors who find disarming humor even in a dramatic setting that is both intoxicating and sometimes bordering on too much information. Celia (Thandiwe Newton) left the job years ago and shed her ties to the CIA in favor of marriage and children; Henry (Chris Pine) is still on the job and he’s been tasked with investigating a deadly airline hijacking from nearly a decade back, when they were both based out of Vienna. Turns out, there was a leak that sabotaged their efforts for a better outcome. In “All the Old Knives,” ex-lovers and spies Henry and Celia meet for dinner in an upscale California beach town.

All the Old Knives is now available to stream on Prime Video. Will the movie head to DVD and Blu-ray in the future? Here's what we can work out.

This is usually the case for theatrical releases, which All the Old Knives is not. We’ll also not likely see it arrive on Digital for the same reason. That leak cost the lives of more than 100 people on a flight, and the rogue CIA agent may be this veteran’s former lover.

Despite the best efforts of a CIA team, a plane hijacking ends in disaster. Years later, one member of that team, Henry (Chris Pine) is tasked with finding ...

The narrative device that frames the film is a reunion dinner between two former colleagues and lovers, Henry (Pine) and Celia ( Thandiwe Newton), as they recall the disastrous events of the hijacking over fine wine and a three-course meal. What really sets it apart from the usual Bourne clones, however, is the romantic and almost psychosexual drama underpinning it all. The filmmakers are clearly interested in depicting the nuts and bolts of espionage as much as anything: meeting sources, establishing trust, strategising, negotiating.

The film opens with a harrowing flashback as a terrorist hijacking unfolds aboard a plane. The CIA's Vienna Field Office is thrown into chaos as they try to ...

There is some irony in the fact that All The Old Knives is set in 2012 because it feels like a film that was made in the late-aughts-early-teens. Pine and Newton are its saving grace, with their performances elevating it just above the waters of drowning in its own self-importance. It’s a decent enough script, though it relies too heavily on the “the CIA are the good guys” trope, and it never fully unpacks that sentiment. It’s really confounding when the rest of the camerawork helps to build up the uncertain intrigue of the plot and crafts a really beautiful image. Pine and Newton have spectacular chemistry and that connection carried the burden of a disjointed script. On the day of the hijacking, Henry and Celia were head-over-heels in love and planning to move in together, but in the wake of the attack, Celia packs her things and vanishes into the night without the closure Henry needed.

As spies and ex-lovers, Thandiwe Newton and Chris Pine craft a reserved chemistry in Janus Metz's romantic espionage thriller 'All the Old Knives'

The film is a compelling concept that doesn’t thread the needle of its competing impulses quite as gracefully as it might have, but driven by the imminently watchable Newton and Pine, it makes for the kind of adult-oriented storytelling one wishes there was more of these days. The film’s big love scene is more dramatic than erotic, though it does include a heat and passion that is missing from much of the rest of the film. Such is the aim of “All the Old Knives,” a cerebral thriller with an elegant sensibility directed by Janus Metz from a screenplay by Olen Steinhauer adapting his own novel.

The thriller film, based on the book of the same name by Olen Steinhauer, follows an investigation into a devastating terrorist attack.

“All the Old Knives” is based on the book of the same name by Olen Steinhauer, who also wrote the screenplay. You can sign up here. Using flashbacks to weave together multiple timelines, the film peels back the layers of their past romance and exposes the truth behind a devastating terrorist attack.

Loves and loyalties collide in slow-motion for Chris Pine and Thandiwe Newton in this sluggish CIA thriller with promise but no payoff.

Elsewhere, screenwriter (and author of the original novel) Olen Steinhauer could maybe have used some help to help tighten things up, just as director Janus Metz Pedersen is in sore need of an editor to lift the mood. It’s weird to see a male action star play someone their own age for once, and Pine settles into the more seasoned dramatic role well, but Newton outshines him. Walking into a bar that only serves wine to try and order a vodka martini, Henry Pelham (Pine) is a very Chardonnay 007 – colder, sadder and far less exciting than the stuff you see in other movies, though probably a lot more realistic.

The film then uses parallel timelines, cutting between the current conversation between Henry and Celia and extended flashbacks showing what they were doing ...

As espionage narratives go, “All the Old Knives,” which is based on the novel by Olen Steinhauer (who also wrote the screenplay), is closer to the more cerebral and realistic creations of John le Carré than the comic book fantasies of James Bond (underscored perhaps a bit too bluntly at one point where Henry attempts to order a vodka martini and is rebuffed). The early set-up scenes are reasonably intriguing but at a certain point, things just stop working. It soon becomes clear at least one of them knows more about what happened than they are letting on, and that the sumptuous feast they have been consuming will most likely prove to be the last meal for at least one of them. Henry is charged with interviewing the surviving members of the group—one mysteriously committed suicide a couple of months after the incident—to see if he can ferret out which one is guilty.

By Kharisma McIlwaine. *This review contains spoilers*. Betrayal is one of the worst aspects of the human experience, be it professional or personal.

“All The Old Knives” serves as a reminder to ask the hard questions from the people you love and to offer grace in the place of doubt. Celia and Henry play coy as they each attempt to excerpt information that will lead to the revelation of the mole. The revelation of the truth however, is devastating betrayal. During his quest for the truth, Henry travels from Austria to England to California. First, Henry interviews Bill Compton (Pryce), a retired former member of his team who currently resides in London. During his visit to Carmel-by-the-Sea in California, Henry is reunited with another CIA operative, his former colleague and ex-lover Celia Harrison (Newton). Sparks fly over dinner as the two talk about old times through a series of flashbacks. Embarrassed by the high-profile incident, the CIA is still dedicated to discovering the identity of the mole responsible. “All The Old Knives,” adapted from Olen Steinhauer’s novel of the same name, opens in 2012 inside the cabin of Flight 127, which is being hijacked.

The year is 2011, and CIA agents Henry (Chris Pine) and Celia (Thandiwe Newton) are colleagues and lovers. But one fateful day, a terrible (fictional) terrorist ...

Plot twist: Celia tells Henry she knows he was the one who made the call on Bill’s phone, and that he is the mole who leaked the information about Ahmed to the terrorists. In the final scene, we see Vick get a call letting him know that Henry is dead, while Celia walks down the street, thinking about her past relationship with Henry. Then she goes home to her husband and child and goes back to her life. Remember that weird meeting Celia had with the Muslim Women’s Foundation? It turns out that while Celia was at that meeting, Henry was at a meeting of his own, with Ilyas Shishani, the man behind the attack. Then Henry gets a call from the assassin he hired, asking whether or not he should kill Celia. Henry is too far gone to answer, so in the end, the assassin does not kill Celia—but we’re left wondering what he would have said. Celia is devastated that Henry would try to pin this on her, and ruin her life when he knows she is innocent. At the same time, Henry seems to be ready to pin the leak on his aging colleague Bill Compton. After all, it was Bill’s phone that had a call to Tehran on the same day as the attack, and Bill does act pretty suspicious when Henry is interviewing him. In the flashbacks, we learn that on the day of the attack, Celia discovered the suspicious call to Tehran made from Bill’s phone on the call log. Read on for the All the Old Knives plot summary and the All the Old Knives ending, explained. At the end of this day horrible day, Henry and Celia share a desperate, passionate night together. In the present day, Celia tells Henry she doesn’t believe the man had information, and just wanted money—but Henry’s reaction suggests he knows something she doesn’t. Vick, the boss, stresses that no one else can know about Ahmed. Later, when Ahmed sends a new message to the CIA telling the agency to comply with all of the terrorists’ demands—in a completely different tone of voice—they suspect that the message is not really from him. Based on the novel of the same name by Olen Steinhauer—who also adapted the screenplay—All the Old Knives is a quiet spy thriller directed by Danish filmmaker Janus Metz Pedersen. Most of the film is spent over the course of a dinner between Pine and Newton’s characters, as the two recall a traumatic day in their past lives as CIA agents and lovers.