Director John Boorman has been responsible for some truly great movies. Films like Deliverance and Hope and Glory are two of my favorites. Now, he returns with his first film since the striking The General.

The Tailor of Panama features Geoffrey Rush as a suit-maker in Panama city. Pierce Brosnan is a British spy who decides to blackmail Rush into digging up dirt and information from the various politicians he suits up. Before long, things become chaotic as Rush gets in over his head.

Rush plays the tailor as a shy, tall tale telling nerd. He is believable in the role, but it's hardly a part of great depth. Brosnan, on the other hand, seems to take devilish glee in his role as a self assured womanizer who will do anything to get what he wants. He's smug and absolutely hilarious in the part. Jamie Lee Curtis is effective but seems a bit out of place as Rush's loving wife. The film's best performance comes from Brendan Gleeson (Braveheart) as Rush's drunken, loudmouth buddy.

What really took me off guard in The Tailor of Panama, is how funny it is. I expected a straight faced spy and espionage thriller, and while the picture has a fare share of that, it also has a rather strange sense of humor. Particularly the scenes featuring Dylan Baker as an over the top military man (think Alec Baldwin in Pearl Harbor).

Boorman directs at a rather slow pace and never really gives us the sense of tension that the movie needs to fully succeed. Still, the picture does offer up some good surprises. The Tailor of Panama is also punctuated with a great ending in which every character gets what's coming to them. As a spy flick, I wouldn't rank The Tailor of Panama with David Mamet's brilliant The Spanish Prisoner, but it is entertaining nonetheless, and it should also be noted that for a Brosnan movie, I liked it more then The Thomas Crown Affair and that last crappy James Bond flick.