I have seen Roman Polanski’s new film, The Ghost Writer, and I can tell you that it’s very, very good (for those playing along with my Year of Living OCD blog posts, this was the first secret movie I couldn’t divulge). The film is funny and tense, and Polanski has a good time playing with the tropes of the thriller genre while actually making an often edge of your seat thriller. Ewan McGregor is fantastic as the ghost writer hired to help Pierce Brosnan’s character, named I Might As Well Be Called Tony Blair, finish his memoirs. The previous ghost writer died under mysterious circumstances, and Ewan soon finds himself deep in a web that includes secret agents, femme fatales, torture flights and the War on Terror.

Sadly the movie will be overshadowed by the fact that Polanski was arrested while completing it; frankly whatever you think about Polanski and his case this is simply a damn  good movie. It’s great that it’s opening in the same month as Shutter Island, because like Scorsese in that film The Ghost Writer shows a Polanski remembering how to use all those muscles he used to flex back in  the day. Both films are great filmmakers getting back to the simple business of great filmmaking – entertaining, well made and a damn good time at the movies.

Oh, and about The Ghost Writer – it’s early but the film’s score by Alexandre Desplat is probably one of the year’s best. It was so good I thought it was a temp score lifted from an old classic that I didn’t recognize.

So here’s the one sheet for The Ghost Writer. Look for more from me on the film as we get closer to release.