Stoutor It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

Siflutter It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Suman Roberson It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Edison Witt The first must-see film of the year.

newjersian French cinema is famous for its romantic comedies and melodramas. When French movie makers try to change the genre, it's usually resulted in a flop. Secret Defense is an example of that unsuccessful attempt to mimic an American action movie. The creators of that movie really tried to do it cool, but on every turn the movie becomes really laughable. Maybe an audience of school children can believe the plot which is absolutely primitive and false. And the actors... How could the director let Vahina Giocante be so hysterical while playing a role of a trained secret agent? Her eyes are always deceiving her, even in scenes in which there is no need to be worried. She always runs and moves chaotically, and her amateurish performance finally kills the movie, which anyway has a very weak plot. I would recommend watching that movie only on a deserted island while it's raining outside. In other circumstances do something more attractive.

dromasca What is bluntly visible in this French film is the American look. Actually it is not only the look - the whole approach taken by the film starting with its story and I dare say with its ideology, going through the rapid pace and crisp editing style and ending with the style of acting is borrowed from the American 'war on terror' movies. We even have some kind of a French equivalent of the CIA headquarters in this film. The most amazing things is however that the combination works. Philippe Haim is a talented director and his 'Secret Defense' is a good American thriller even if it is acted in French.Recruiting a young and sexy woman who finds herself in some kind of distress and turning her into a spy is a theme that we have already met in the classical Nikita, and original French film turned into an American movie and than successful TV series. The world of Secret Defense is however today's France and Middle East, and a parallel thread develops the background of an abused criminal who falls of dark side of the war on terror. The paths of the two characters are to meet inexorably, and we know it from almost from the beginning. The smart and unfortunately true idea of the script is that both the good girl and the bad guy are victims, paws, foot soldiers in war machines that confront each other and eventually crush everybody who falls under their wheels.The story has logic and the development of the main character played by Vahina Giocante is credible and does not lack an unexpected dose of sensitivity. There is one moment only when the accumulation of coincidences seemed to me to be hard to believe, but otherwise the story line and the excellent acting, the exact rendering of the various environments and the pace of action built upon interleaved threads contribute all to the good quality of a film that has an American look, and this time I am writing this appreciation on its positive meaning.

albert9999 Contains spoilers. This movie is not very french at all. It is a rather poor attempt to transfer the ideology of some US-Secret-Service-flicks to french cinema. The movie consists of a mechanical subsequence of disgusting out-of-law practices of some secret-service-maniacs and some crazy guys that are not any better than the Secret-Service guys. The director tries hard to convince the viewer, that things work that way in reality and that its good that way, i.e. co-workers can be tortured any time just because of their religion - you never know. Women are shown as sexual objects and abuse is not only part of the game but it is the game. What makes this movie disgusting is that the directors don't crititze thiese practices, but they advertise it. They show what they think - their own narrow-minded fear driven moral.Plot is poor too: The movie starts with a girl that doesn't pass an exam at university and is then consoled by another student. Surprise surprise, the co-student is an undercover recruiter and his boss blackmails the girl into becoming an agent (as a student she earned her money as a prostitute). She then has to get into sexual intercourse with a terrorist to find out about his plans to release Vx-Gas in Paris. The second storyline is about a french guy that has to deal with drugs to finance his mothers apartment. He is caught and brought to prison. To avoid sexual intercourse with other inmates he is forced to join the local islamistic-group in prison and gets radicalized by them (some hugs, a bit of meat and some isolation do the job). He is picked by the terrorist to be the one to release the Vx-Gas in the metro of Paris. After some luggage swapping in some airports the girl stops the guy in the metro and the ending credits say: Since 2001 french intelligence could prevent 15 attacks in France.

AndreHeeger The filmmaker Philippe Haim obviously likes Ridley and Tony Scott and with Secret Defense he delivers a nice try. The problem: he keeps too much to the surface.Secret Defense has the pace of a Tony Scott production but lacks the depth of character of other movies in the genre like f.e. Syriana. Recruiting a prostitute/student and turning her into a top agent in a matter of (movie) minutes takes some skills. Vahina Giocante sure is pretty (and she was perfect in Lila Dit Ca) but she never gets the chance to deliver a convincing personality (nor do most of the other actors). Half an hour more would have helped the story a lot. The question of course remains: would Haim have been able to fill it accordingly?But its not just that. The story is too flat, has too many clichés chasing each other and most characters are mainly one dimensional.Which doesn't mean Secret Defense doesn't deliver. If you like your spy stories to be more like action movies you're in for a treat. A touch of Bourne and Bruce Willis, a bomb here, a sexy agent there. Not bad at all. Just nothing like the real thing.