There is not one second of action or violence in The Russia House. It’s a very slow burn, mostly full of people talking, but I loved it.
Set in the late 1980s, just as glasnost and perestroika were taking hold, Sean Connery plays Barley Blair, a drunken book publisher with a thing for Russia. A woman tries to pass him a manuscript containing nuclear secrets, but it ends up in the hands of British and American intelligence. They use Blair to figure out if the writer is legitimate and if he has more information.
Connery is fantastic as the weary and reluctant hero, and Michelle Pfeiffer acts with a believable Russian accent as the woman caught in the middle of warring intelligence agencies (she got a Golden Globe nomination for it). The Soviet spy is played Klaus Maria Brandauer, which reunites him with Connery seven years after they starred in Never Say Never Again together.
It was the first film shot mostly on-location in Russia. The camera drinks in the scenery — at the time, it was a rare look inside the country, just before the Soviet Union dissolved. The soundtrack is a spectacular combination of symphony and jazz which has been released multiple times as a standalone album.
Lovely movie. Absolutely worth the time.