THE WHISTLEBLOWER (2010)

cast: Rachel Weisz, Venessa Redgrave, David Strathairn, Nikolaj Lie Kaaas, Monica Bellucci, Jeannette Hain
Directed by Larysa Kondracki
Distributed by Samuel Goldwyn Films

release date: August 5, 2011 (limited release in US)
June, 23, 2010 (release in Denmark)


Rotten Tomatoes    IMDB

Think twice before dismissing The Whistle Blower as just another movie based upon the sex-trafficking trade. This is more real and unfortunately you will not have a Liam Neeson coming and kicking ass to save the day like TAKEN. 

But this is a movie designed to unsettle you and hopefully infuriate you as you realize this is based on true events as put down by Kathyrn Bolkovac in her book called THE WHISTLEBLOWER, based on her experiences while serving for the UN in Bosnia.

Rachel Weisz plays the role of real life Bolkovac, a Nebraska based police offier who finds herself short of finances to keep herself with her daughter after divorce. So when she is offered a six month offer to join a UN peace keeping force with a good pay, she takes up the job immediately.

But once in Bosnia, she takes up her job as seriously and dutifully as she always does resulting in her getting promoted and an extended stay. But her investigation soon falls on a local seedy bar and things take a turn for the worse.

Single handedly she beings to discover truths behind missing and tortured under aged girls and unravels a whole network of sex-trafficking that is going on. Shockingly, she discovers that this is being carried out by several of her own colleagues and despite all the evidences she manages to gather, it ends futile since the high officials are keen to keep matters under wraps. Yet Bolkovac refuses to give in, clinging onto a faint thread of hope.

Rachel Weisz nails the lead role totally bringing in the apt vulnerability into her portrayal. She captures the helplessness brilliantly as she goes about her crusade in a losing battle yet surfaces constantly as a character of mettle. 

The rest of the cast never really gets to impress, except for Jeanette Hain as the mother of one of the abducted girls and Vanessa Redgrave as a senior UN official. Monica Bellucia is present in a rather bland cameo of sorts.

Larysa Kondracki’s effort in the director’s chair is quite commendable, but not without leaving room for improvement. To start off with, the sexism is a little too blatant for realistic tastes. Everyone out there seems a big bad wolf in this version and that does makes things a little too far fetched. 

Several scenes seem to be shot out like the average B-grade exploitation flicks and one wonders whether it was a conscious move or just plain ol’ bad lighting. The pacing is a lot uneven and does not exactly meet the thriller standards. What it does manage though is to achieve its primary objective, that is to throw the light at the issue on hand. It does manage to unsettle the audience by exposing the murky truths about these peacekeeping forces and on how far the contracting companies would go to keep matters hush-hush when you have lucrative contracts at risk. But one would certainly not be shocked when they learn that US still continues to maintain contracts with these companies even after several accusations and law suits. You can be angry to a point, because, ultimately what the Whistle Blower exhibits is matters that have been exposed. You can be rest assured that what really goes out there, could be only far worse. 

Rating:  3 outta 5 

THE PANEL ROOM

Rachel Weisz puts on a compelling smoldering act though the film suffers from a literal-minded approach to the material.. ROTTENTOMATOES  6.5/10

“The Whistleblower” comes off as an earnest but sluggish tale of corruption in the aftermath of the Bosnian war.  Frank Sweitek   C-

The movie, constructed as a relentless and frightening thriller stars Rachel Weisz in one of her best performances "  Roger Ebert  3.5/4

...a classic example of a film that doesn't trust the strength of its source material-or the intelligence of its audience. Michael Sullivan 1/4