BY DOUG OSWALD

“Company Business” features Gene Hackman and Mikhail Baryshnikov in an espionage thriller directed by Nicholas Meyer. The Cold War is over and a former CIA agent is called out of retirement to exchange an imprisoned Russian agent for a captured American pilot. The movie was released in 1991 just as the Soviet Union ceased to exist and the Russian Federation was born. Old tensions between East and West remain and the movie tries to be a tense “Cold War” style thriller.

Hackman is Sam Boyd, a retired CIA agent who is using his skills as a corporate spy. Mikhail Baryshnikov is Pyotr Ivanovich Grushenko, a former Soviet spy serving time in an American prison. Sam is called out of retirement to exchange Pyotr for the American being held by the Russians. Glasnost and perestroika indeed, or so it would appear. Sam escorts Pyotr to the recently reunited Germany along with a case filled with a million dollars when he realizes they are being tricked by the Russians. It turns out the exchange is a fake and they are involved in an elaborate double cross and money laundering scheme involving the Russians and Americans.

Hot on their trail are the American and Russian agents attempting to get the money back and to kill Sam and Pyotr who form an alliance and make their way through Germany and on to Paris. It’s not exactly clear what they plan on doing once they get there or how they plan on getting away with their lives and the movie’s ending does little to clear things up. The main problem is that the story was obviously meant to be a typical Cold War thriller. Nicholas Meyer does a good job as writer and director, but it’s clear that the story just was not going to work after the Cold War ended during production. What do you do with a Cold War thriller after the Soviet Union ceases to exist? It was an unfortunate time to produce such a movie.

Hackman is a great actor and Baryshnikov is generally good, but they both appear bored and don’t really look like they’re into it. The supporting actors are almost comical in a painful way in their attempts to play it straight, but one can predict everything that’s going to happen before it plays out. The movie is trying to be a kind of comic buddy movie, but it never quite works out. Géraldine Danon is on hand as a French woman who turns out to be Pyotr’s daughter, but she serves no serious purpose other than to launder the money through a Swiss bank to make it untraceable (I guess).

Kurtwood Smith is on hand as Sam’s CIA contact and is good in just about everything he’s in. Terry O’Quinn is also on hand, but other than being the mastermind behind the money laundering scheme, he doesn’t have much to do. The central plot is too full of holes and none of it really makes any sense. Why not just keep the cash and hide somewhere in luxury? Instead Sam and Pyotr keep exposing themselves by meeting with old friends and known associates in cities filled to the brim with spies.

The movie looks fine on Kino Lorber’s Blu-ray and showcases some fine on-location work in Germany and France. The night-time street scenes in Germany are very nicely shot and the movie is an easy going 98 minutes. The disc contains a featurette with interviews by a very bored Hackman as well as out-takes, sound bites and the trailer. Interestingly, the trailer attempts to sell the film as a buddy comedy and features a scene not in the movie with the leads living in retirement on a tropical island. I’d say catch this movie if you have to see everything by Gene Hackman, Mikhail Baryshnikov and director Nicholas Meyer.

CLICK HERE TO ORDER FROM AMAZON