"BREACH" (2007) ..... B+ ... Chris Cooper, one of our most underrated actors, offers another stunning character portrayal with his take on FBI traitor, Robert Hanssen. This is a smartly made biopic about real life events, but its examination of this fascinating affair is surprisingly distant.

In spite of the strong performances throughout, this film appeals only to the intellect and not to the heart. Perhaps this is because the two leads keep their innermost thoughts and true personalities well hidden in this double web of intrigue. Or perhaps it is because the only two really likable people in this movie are their long-suffering wives, Bonnie Hanssen (Kathleen Quinlan) and Juliana O'Neill (Caroline Dhavernas), who have only minor roles.

Hanssen went to jail for life without a chance for parole for being the covert FBI "intel" spy who had sold more damaging secrets to the Soviet Union over a longer period of time than any other US agent in history, including the infamous Aldrich Ames. His life was couched in ambiguity as a covert spy, but little did his superiors suspect that this ambiguity suffused the rest of his intellectual and moral life as well. A brilliant man, he operated under an antithetical moral code that would, and did, baffle most normal people.

A long term careerist in the FBI, Hanssen turned on his agency when he realized that a man from the intelligence ("intel") side of the Bureau would never be appointed to head the FBI. His well-masked anger and chagrin only deepened when he was passed over for this appointment and Louis Freeh was instead appointed to head the Bureau.

A devout Catholic, he sold secrets without scruple to an atheistic country. He was also a sexually ambiguous man with a fetish for porno films. Although a devoted family man and a doting grandfather, he marketed self-made porno movies of his wife and himself to his fellow deviates in that nether world.

Hanssen was so convincing in his normal, overt life that for years no one could believe that he had so many hidden agendas without any of them coming to light. He was even placed in charge of a covert committee to unmask the traitor who was selling such damaging secrets to the Soviet Union without any of his superiors suspecting that he himself was that very traitor.

One of the main reasons that Hanssen was able to pull off his ugly charade for such a long period of time was the fact that he was a computer genius who was able to encrypt his messages so that they couldn't be opened. He also had a sixth sense for prying eyes and he was a great study of human character. As the smartest guy in virtually every room, Hanssen was way ahead of everyone else in practically any situation. Even his Soviet contacts had no idea as to his true identity to prevent his cover from being blown by an agent from the other side.

It was only when too many highly placed Soviet double agents began turning up dead that the FBI knew that they had an equally high-ranking traitor in their midst. When suspicion finally began to dwell on Hanssen, his superiors realized that they would have to move fast to unmask him. His mandated 25 year retirement was but months away, and they had little, if any, damning evidence on him. To protect their continuing covert operations, they had to move Hanssen to a less secure area of operations, and he began to suspect that the game might be over.

Hanssen's superiors reached down to pick a greenhorn to the Agency, for they realized that Hanssen would recognize a fellow agent from a mile away. Agent-in-training Eric O'Neill (Ryan Phillippe) was selected for this delicate task. They correctly figured that Hanssen would relate to a fellow Catholic and a tech geek with smarts. O'Neill further ingratiated himself into Hanssen's good graces by being happily married. The O'Neills and the Hanssens soon became friends in spite of Juliana's very discomforting intuition that something was not right with Hanssen. This movie never made it clear about whether Bonnie's feminine intuition about her husband might have been equally discerning.

O'Neill turned out to be a brilliant choice on the intel side, since he quickly came to admire Hanssen for his good qualities. He played the role of the inside man to perfection in spite of a pager that went off at the most inopportune times. Even though Hanssen had his occasional suspicions, he bought into the lie that the pager was O'Neill's connection to his wife, Juliana, instead of to his handler, Kate Burroughs (Laura Linney).

O'Neill was over time able to convey a complete dossier of information to Burroughs and other handlers and contact personnel who were monitoring O'Neill's progress from a discreet distance. 110 minutes and rated PG-13 for violence, sexual content and language.