The Company You Keep

Genre:

Thriller

Director:

Robert Redford

Starring:

Shia LaBeouf, Robert Redford, Julie Christie, Richard Jenkins, Susan Sarandon, Stephen Root, Sam Elliott, Brendan Gleeson, Terrence Howard, Anna Kendrick, Jackie Evancho

Release Date:

Friday 05 April

      The Company You Keep is a 2012 political action thriller, produced and directed by Robert Redford. The script was written by Lem Dobbs based on the 2003 novel of the same name by Neil Gordon. Produced by Nicolas Chartier (Voltage Pictures), Redford and Bill Holderman, the movie filmed in Vancouver in autumn 2011.

      The story centers on recent widower and single father, Jim Grant, a former Weather Underground anti-Vietnam War militant wanted for a bank robbery and murder, who hid from the FBI for over thirty years posing as an Albany attorney. He becomes a fugitive when his true identity is exposed by Ben Shepard, an aggressive young reporter. Grant must find his ex-lover, Mimi, the one person who can clear his name, before the FBI catches him. Otherwise, he will lose everything, including his 11-year-old daughter Isabel. While Ben struggles with ethical issues as a journalist, Jim and his old friends from the Weather Underground must live with the consequences of their radical past.

      After film festival screenings in September 2012, the film's first theatrical release was in Italy in December 2012. A U.S. limited release is planned for April, followed by a release in the U.K. in June 2013.

Plot

      A recently widowed single father, Jim Grant (Robert Redford), is a former Weather Underground militant wanted for a Michigan bank robbery and the murder of the bank's security guard (an off-duty police officer) in the 1970s. He has been in hiding from the FBI for over thirty years, becoming an attorney near Albany, New York. When Sharon Solarz (Susan Sarandon), another former Weather Underground member, is arrested, an ambitious young reporter, Ben Shepard (Shia LaBeouf), smells an opportunity to make a name for himself with a national story. He gets himself assigned to chase it down by his prickly editor, Ray Fuller (Stanley Tucci). Ben's ex-girlfriend, Diana (Anna Kendrick), is an FBI agent, and he presses her for information about the case. She tells him that Sharon came to town to visit Billy Cusimano (Stephen Root), an old hippie who runs an organic grocery. Billy, a friend and client of Jim's, tells Jim about the arrest. Billy is surprised and disappointed that Jim doesn't want to take Sharon's case, and he conveys this information to Ben when Ben questions him. Ben pursues Jim and tries to question him, but Jim tells him to get lost.

      Spooked by the investigation, Jim takes his 11-year-old daughter, Isabel (Jackie Evancho), and drives to a bus station at the Canadian border; there, he buys bus tickets to Toronto. He tells Isabel that they are taking "a little trip". A neighbor has filed a missing persons report. Ben tells the FBI about the report and that a middle-aged man matching Jim’s description bought bus tickets to Toronto. Ben has also found out that Mimi Lurie (Julie Christie), an accomplice in the Michigan bank robbery, was last seen in Canada. A private investigator tells Ben that Jim had no Social Security number prior to 1978. Ben tells the FBI to check Jim's fingerprints against Nick Sloan, another fugitive from the robbery.

========================================================================

References.

External links:

"Main Page." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 06 April. 2013. Web.  06 April. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page>.

https://www.google.com/imghp?hl=en&tab=wi 

 

========================================================================

What do you think about this movie? Waiting for your comments. Thank you !