OPERATION NAPOLEON - Mark Reviews Movies

Operation Napoleon, Magnet Releasing

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Review by Mark Dujsik | August 10, 2023

Assuming that its mystery is enough to both compel us and propel this story, Operation Napoleon is a shallow slog of a thriller. The filmmakers' main assumption, obviously, was incorrect.

Essentially a lengthy chase and historical investigation around Iceland, the plot follows Kristín (Vivian Ólafsdóttir), a successful lawyer who becomes involved in an international, decades-spanning conspiracy about, well, something. Marteinn Thorisson's screenplay, an adaptation of Arnaldur Indriðason's novel, is particularly cagey about the specifics of what so many people have wanted and been willing to kill for since the end of World War II, after a German plane crash landed on an expansive glacier in the country.

Without any sense of what secrets the plane and its long-dead crew might hold, the movie depends on its characters and its plotting to carry the narrative weight and provide some idea of the stakes here. These characters, though, only exist to take us through the movie's routine plot, which primarily serves to tease us about the possibilities of the supposedly great mystery at the story's core. The circular logic of all of this is transparent.

Anyway, Kristín is confronted by one of the several henchmen working for CIA agent William Carr (Iain Glen), who has been searching for the plane wreckage for a long time. The impetus for this is that Kristín's brother Elías (Atli Óskar Fjalarsson) has discovered the crashed plane while on an expedition with some friends. The brother sends Kristín some photos and a video of the plane, leading Carr and his assorted goons to clean up any evidence that the wreckage exists.

What follows, then, is a long pursuit across the country, with Kristín (framed for murder, by the way, in a subplot that ultimately means nothing) enlisting the aid of history professor and former flame Steve (Jack Fox). His expertise conveniently lines up exactly with the information Kristín needs to find the exact location of the wreck and, more importantly, her brother.

That's just the first of many handy coincidences the two encounter along the way—from long-lost relatives, to villains who don't seem too skilled at their jobs, to what might be a magically reassembled cellphone. The happy contrivances culminate in what must be among the luckiest or most impossibly skillful gunshots in the history of the movies. That's just part of the belatedly ridiculous climax of the story, which seems to be adding all of the conflict the rest of the movie has lacked at the last possible moment.

All the while, the characters talk and talk about how important the plane's secret is and could be, meaning that Operation Napoleon has set itself up for disappointment. There's no way what anyone could find in or near the wreck could live up to the hype, and sure enough, it doesn't, although that doesn't stop the filmmakers from wasting more time setting up a sequel.

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