Retired CIA agent Celia Harrison (Thandiwe Newton) meets with her former colleague Henry Pelham (Chris Pine) in a restaurant in Carmel; as wine is poured and dinner served, they begin to discuss the tragic 2012 hijacking of a plane… The kind of spy thriller where you might as well pour yourself a drink and be seduced by an impossibly prolonged Carmel sunset, the charms of two attractive leads whose characters once were lovers, and the intricate intrigues behind the hijacking, revealed in extensive flashbacks. Not all of it may hold up to scrutiny, but it’s lush and earns one’s attention throughout.

2022-U.S. 101 min. Color. Widescreen. Directed by Janus Metz Pedersen. Screenplay, Novel: Olen Steinhauer. Cast: Chris Pine (Henry Pelham), Thandiwe Newton (Celia Harrison), Laurence Fishburne (Vick Wallinger), David Dawson, Jonathan Pryce, Gala Gordon.

Trivia: Co-executive produced by Pine. Michelle Williams was originally cast in Newton’s role.