74
Metascore
36 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80The Hollywood ReporterKirk HoneycuttThe Hollywood ReporterKirk HoneycuttIn this film, everything comes down to the acting. Chris Cooper, one of our finest screen actors, gets inside the mysterious traitor. Ryan Phillippe has just the right gung-ho determination tempered with a touch of naivete as O'Neill. Meanwhile, Laura Linney nails the role of a career agent.
- 80NewsweekDavid AnsenNewsweekDavid AnsenA wonderfully taut cat-and-mouse thriller.
- 80Village VoiceVillage VoiceThis is a spy movie bereft of the genre's usual, casual kicks. It's not interested in cheap thrills or playing gotcha with the audience. (Which isn't to say parts of it aren't exhilarating.)
- 80L.A. WeeklyScott FoundasL.A. WeeklyScott FoundasHere is one of the best American actors (Chris Cooper) in one of his best parts.
- 75Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanEntertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanNow Ray has directed his second film, the abysmally titled Breach, and it's a bona fide companion piece, another true-life tale of duplicity gone secretly insane.
- 75Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanCharlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanLike "Shattered Glass," the other picture Billy Ray directed, Breach probes a guilty mind and reveals how he baffled people. We get a Hitchcock-like pleasure from knowing the protagonist is guilty and watching other shocked characters realize his wickedness.
- 70New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinNew York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinCooper's performance is outlandishly great, but Phillippe’s knocks Breach down a peg.
- 70VarietyTodd McCarthyVarietyTodd McCarthyJust as somber as "The Good Shepherd," the most recent domestic spy drama, but more tightly focused, Breach absorbingly zeroes in on how the FBI nailed the most damaging turncoat in American history.
- 67Austin ChronicleAustin ChronicleThese days it's going to take a pretty exceptional political thriller to top our political reality for sheer suspense and treachery, and though director Ray (Shattered Glass) provides a few choice moments of psychological tension, nothing in his film can hope to outpace the anxiety caused by the appearance of former Attorney General John Ashcroft in its opening scene.
- 50The New YorkerDavid DenbyThe New YorkerDavid DenbyThe unexciting look and feel of the movie wouldn’t have bothered me if the filmmakers had penetrated Hanssen’s skull a little.