DIPLOMATIC SIEGE
US, 1999, 90 minutes, Colour.
Peter Weller, Daryl Hannah, Tom Berenger, Adrian Pintea, Uwe Ochsenknecht, Jeremy Lelliot, Brion James.
Directed by Gustavo Graef- Marino.
Diplomatic Siege is one of those quickie films made for video release rather than for cinema. It is filmed on location in Romania and focuses on the siege of the American embassy in Bucharest.
The premise is interesting, though treated in melodramatic fashion. It seems that the Americans had planted nuclear bombs in eastern European embassies just in case of confrontation with the Soviet Union. during the 1990s, all these bombs must be defused. When an expert (Peter Weller) travels to Bucharest to do this work, he encounters an old flame (Daryl Hannah). The embassy is attacked by the Serbian Liberation Front (echoes of the Balkan wars and diplomacy during the 90s), and there is a time limit for the defusing of the bomb, and the relief of the siege with the threat to hostages (including the expert’s young son).
Peter Weller looks anxious – although he is given some rather implausible romantic scenes with Daryl Hannah. Daryl Hannah suddenly turns out to be one of the villains of the piece, after money because of disregard by the American government. Tom Berenger is the four-star general sent in to take command of the siege – although the national secretary adviser does not let him know what is mainly happening.
There is a time limit to the final countdown, a split-second saving of the world – or, at least, of Romania.
1.Entertaining action movie? 1990s politics? International relationships? The aftermath of the Cold War? Plausible?
2.The Romanian settings? Eastern Europe in the 90s? The American embassies? The aftermath of the war in Yugoslavia?
3.The introduction to the characters: Steve Mitchell, arriving with Chris, the antagonism between the two? Chris and his supposed to be going on the tour with the girl and her guardian? His getting back into the building? Steve, the authorities, his mission? Meeting Erica, the memories of the past, the sexual encounter? The collaboration during the siege? The dangers? Finding Chris still in the building, the rescue through the manhole? The escape with Erica?
4.Erica, her past history, Daryl Hannah’s style? The collaboration, the sexual encounter – plausible or not? Their working together, in the siege, her escaping from the room? Helping Chris?
5.The background to the terrorists? The opening with the colonel, his being at the ball, the drugging by the pianist? His going into the toilet, his being taken by the American authorities? The imprisonment? The Hague and the international tribunals? The demands of the terrorists for his release? The pressures, the release, his death?
6.Goran and the group of terrorists? The taking of the embassy? The brutality of the shootings? The hostages? The ambassador, sending him out, his escape, the bomb in his pocket, the blowing up of the van? The other hostages? The shootings? His personality, the fact that he had been educated in the United States, his patriotic change of heart? His assistants? The conduct of the siege, Buck Swain and the contact, their meeting, the discussions about the past? His ruthlessness? His not knowing about the bomb? The revelation of his liaison with Erica and the plan? The siege of the building by the Americans? His death?
7.The ruse of the Americans, the secretary for national security, his decisions, the information about the bombs in the embassies? General Stubbs and his criticisms, his being in the loop? The contact with Swain, not telling him about the bombs? The substitute for the colonel, the interview, his saving the day about his daughters – but Goran and his realisation that the shoes were wrong? The woman going out of the embassy after her husband was killed? Her beginning to shoot?
8.The issue of the bomb, Erica and her betrayal, the time going down, Steve and his attempts to defuse the bomb? The Americans entering, shooting? The traps, the rays, the mines?
9.Steve, his ringing Erica, his nickname being the code? His defusing the bomb?
10.His going out, welcomed by Swain, reunited with Chris, Chris and his new respect for his father? The phone call – and the rather cynical aspect of Erica with the money and Steve sharing in it? The background of American authorities, security advisers, the Pentagon? The issue of bombs planted in embassies? Conspiracy theories?
