Duplicity

Directed by Tony Gilroy (Michael Clayton, 2007), and bringing together the clout of both Clive Owen and Julia Roberts, this spy-thriller with a social conscience and anti-big business twist looks sets to score highly at the box office.

MI6 operative Ray Koval (Owen) and CIA officer Claire Stenwick (Roberts) have quit international espionage in favour of cash-rich corporate spying. Now they are each employed by rival pharmaceutical companies and charged with a mission to find out the secret formula for a potentially lucrative new product.

Needless to say, each is playing dirty to make sure they're on the winning side, but things get more dastardly yet; Claire and Ray also have a bit of romantic history between them, of course, and as this attraction rises, they find trying to outwit each other and remain loyal to the drug companies increasingly tricky.

It is familiar territory, but Owen and Roberts do spark together, as anyone who recalls their turn in Closer (2004) will know. And here, that sexual tension gets an extra high-paced zing from Gilroy, who also scripted the Bourne movies (2004-7) and here employs a similar flashbacking, city-hopping technique; it twists, it turns, it keeps you on your toes, but it's also warm and comic enough to be extremely charming. ·