‘THE AMATEUR’: SPY THRILLER WITH REALLY SOLID CAST
A tense spy thriller from earlier this year, The Amateur has a solid cast and though it runs a little long, it’s still interesting.
The Amateur (2025) Film Review
Working for the CIA as a decoder, Charlie Heller (Rami Malek) does his job well. He’s smart and thanks to an asset, he has secrets of higher up agency officials at his fingertips. But the best thing in his life is his wife, Sarah (Rachel Brosnahan). The pair are happy and best of all, Sarah gives his life purpose and normalcy. Then the unthinkable happens… Sarah dies in a London hostage attack. Gathering all of the intel he can, he takes this to his supervisors who do nothing and so, taking everything in his own hands, Heller uses his cleverness to his advantage and decides he’s going to get justice for his wife.
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‘THE AMATEUR’: SPY THRILLER WITH REALLY SOLID CAST. Review of the 2025 thriller #TheAmateur. #Drama #Movie #Thriller Share on X
The cast list for this film stacks up and impresses beyond just the top two billing names. Also in the cast is Laurence Fishburne, Caitríona Balfe and Holt McCallany (most recently from Netflix’s The Waterfront). Some of the names, no matter how big their star power, aren’t really in The Amateur much, but it’s still worth mentioning that you’ll see them all at some point.
Thankfully the setup of this film isn’t secret so watching this, well, we know that it’s not exactly a “happy” movie. The movie has a kind of The Bourne Identity concept. What’s interesting about this on though is it’s about a hero who, for all intents and purposes, has to learn on the job so to speak as he goes on this crusade.
While perhaps not a favorite thriller film, I would rewatch this. Based on the novel by Robert Littrell, the film is a typical kind of tense movie that keeps Charlie watching as he plots and plans how to handle his plan to seek revenge. This is also the second film that Littrell has writing credits on that adapts this novel. If you like thrillers, but also want to see something that it more about thinking than brawn, well, The Amateur may be the right kind of thriller for you.
Stream, at publication, The Amateur with Hulu; or digitally purchase on places like Prime Video
Content: this title has some strong profanity. There is violence; someone is hit be a van. Others die in different ways including weapons like a gun. There is a tense scene or two that results in death; someone falls from a great height; another is shot. A bomb or two goes off and kills people. The film rates PG-13.
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