Michael Fassbender heads up a killer cast in this new thriller from none-busier director Steven Soderbergh. It’s his second film this year, and it’s only March!
How to watch Black Bag in New Zealand
Black Bag sneaks into New Zealand cinemas, probably using one of those cable rigs like Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible, on March 13, 2025.
What is Black Bag about?
Excellent question. Black Bag is a bit of a black box when it comes to plot details, but the brief precis sees a pair of legendary intelligence agents, George Woodhouse and his wife Kathryn, set against each other when she is suspected of being a traitor, forcing our man George to choose between his wife and his country. So, it’s bit like Mr. & Mrs. Smith, and a bit like the underappreciated Robert Zemeckis World War II thriller, Allied. This one comes from the pen of screenwriter David Koepp, who also wrote Soderbergh’s other 2025 film (so far), Presence.
The cast of Black Bag
Michael Fassbender, who also cropped up in Soderbergh’s pretty-good-if-you-can-stomach-the-lead-actor Haywire, is George Woodhouse; Cate Blanchett is his wife, Kathryn St. Jean; Marisa Abela is Clarissa Dubose; Temu Mad Max Tom Burke is Freddie Smalls; Naomie Harris is Dr. Zoe Vaughan; Regé-Jean Page is Colonel James Stokes; and Pierce Brosnan is Arthur Stieglitz. That’s two James Bond alumni in the cast, too; while Brosnan was 007 himself back in the day, Naomie Harris played Ms. Moneypenny in the Daniel Craig era.
Black Bag trailer
Why we’re excited about Black Bag
Well, it should be a good time. As we’ve noted before, Soderbergh loves bringing an arthouse sensibility to what might otherwise be straight forward genre exercises, and arguably in other hands that’s what Black Bag would be. We’re keen to see what he makes out of a spy thriller. Hopefully something more interesting than the bare bones plot synopsis suggests.
