Backstabbing for Beginners

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Backstabbing for Beginners
Backstabbing for Beginners poster.png
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Per Fly
Written by
Based onBackstabbing for Beginners: My Crash Course in International Diplomacy
by Michael Soussan
Produced by
  • Lars Knudsen
  • Nikolaj Vibe Michelsen
  • Jay Van Hoy
  • Malene Blenkov
Starring
Cinematography Brendan Steacy
Edited byMorten Giese
Music by Todor Kobakov
Production
companies
  • Creative Alliance
  • Eyeworks Scandi Fiction
  • Hoylake Capital
  • Parts and Labor
  • Scythia Films
  • Waterstone Entertainment
Distributed by
Release dates
  • 18 January 2018 (2018-01-18)(Denmark)
  • 27 April 2018 (2018-04-27)(United States)
Running time
104 minutes
Countries
  • Canada
  • Denmark
  • United States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$8 million
Box office$367,000 [1]

Backstabbing for Beginners is a 2018 political thriller film directed and co-written by Per Fly, and based on the memoirs of Michael Soussan. [2] It follows the real life corruption scandal in the UN Oil-for-Food Programme, and stars Theo James and Ben Kingsley.

Contents

Plot

The film follows Michael Sullivan, the son of US State Department diplomat who died when Michael was young. Michael leaves a lucrative job at a large bank and lands his dream job as a diplomat with the United Nations (UN) in the fall of 2002. He is assigned to work as an assistant to Under-Secretary-General Costa "Pasha" Passaris, the head of the Oil-for-Food Programme, operated since 1995 to help the citizens of Iraq without allowing the oil sales to boost Saddam Hussein and his regime. On his first visit to Baghdad, local UN chief diplomat Christina Dupre makes it clear to Pasha that she is disturbed by the corruption in the programme, and plans to publish a report voicing her concerns. This is the first Michael hears of the problem, and over the course of the film he uncovers a major corruption scandal, whereby payoffs and bribes diverted $20 billion of the funds away from food and into the hands of companies, banks, officials of various governments, and officials of the UN itself, possibly including Pasha, so that Hussein can pocket over $1 billion of the funds.

Michael falls in love with Nashim, a UN worker in Baghdad who reveals aspects of the corruption to Michael, while she covertly works to advance the cause of her own people, the Kurds of northern Iraq. Pasha tries to teach Michael about the realities of diplomacy in a world filled with corruption, highlighting that $60 billion does make it into buying food and medicine for the people of Iraq. As more of the people around him are killed, including Nashim and Dupre, and as the corruption continues even after the programme was de jure terminated in 2003, following the Coalition Invasion of Iraq, a dejected Michael gathers evidence and takes it to The Wall Street Journal .

Cast

Production

The film was a Canada, United States and Denmark co-production. [3] Josh Hutcherson was originally set to star in the movie but dropped out and was replaced by Theo James. [4] Filming started in March 2016 in Marrakech, Morocco, [5] with other scenes shot in Copenhagen in April 2016. [6] The production budget was $8 million. [6]

Release

In June 2017, A24 and DirecTV Cinema acquired U.S. distribution rights to the film. [7] The film was released in Denmark on 18 January 2018. [8] The film was released through DirecTV Cinema on 22 March 2018, before receiving a limited release in the United States on 27 April 2018. [9] [10]

Reception

On Rotten Tomatoes, Backstabbing for Beginners got a 38% approval from 24 reviews, and an average rating of 4.7/10. [11] Review aggregator Metacritic gave the film 48 out of 100, based on 8 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". [12]

Frank Scheck called the film "an inert would-be thriller". [13] Jessica Kiang of the Variety Magazine criticized the "romantic subplot, complete with heavy-breathing sex scene, and some of the more cloak-and-dagger-y intrigue show", which she saw as "Hollywood-izing a complicated and tragic real-world situation". [14] Michael Rechtshaffen of Los Angeles Times said that "despite delivering few actual thrills, the fact-based Backstabbing for Beginners qualifies as an intelligent, well-crafted political thriller". [15]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oil-for-Food Programme</span> Programme headed by the United Nations

The Oil-for-Food Programme (OIP) was established by the United Nations in 1995 to allow Iraq to sell oil on the world market in exchange for food, medicine, and other humanitarian needs for ordinary Iraqi citizens without allowing Iraq to boost its military capabilities.

Benon Vahe Sevan was the head of the United Nations' Oil-for-Food Programme, established in 1996 and charged with preventing Iraq's government from using the proceeds from oil exports for anything but food, medicine and other items to benefit the civilian population.

Claudia Rosett was an American author and journalist. An editorial board member of The Wall Street Journal, she was the only print journalist to witness the Tiananmen Square massacre and later broke the United Nations’ Oil for Food scandal, the largest public fraud in history. After her Journal career in Hong Kong, Moscow, and New York, she wrote a foreign affairs column for Forbes, blogged for PJ Media, and made regular appearances on national television and radio, including Fox Business. She also worked for the Independent Women's Forum and the London Center for Policy Research, and served as an adjunct fellow at the Hudson Institute.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Denmark)</span> Denmark Ministry of Foreign Affairs

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark and its overseas representations are in charge of the Danish Realm's foreign policy and relations. Among these tasks are policy towards the Arctic Council, European Union, Nordic Council, development aid, trade policy and legal affairs in relation to the outside world.

On 6 August 1990, four days after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) placed a comprehensive embargo on Iraq. The sanctions stayed largely in force until 22 May 2003, and persisted in part, including reparations to Kuwait. The original stated purposes of the sanctions were to compel Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, to pay reparations, and to disclose and eliminate any weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

Richard Roth is an American journalist, a CNN correspondent who covers the United Nations. He was the host of Diplomatic License, a weekly program that was devoted to United Nations affairs. Roth is a CNN "original" — one of the first employees when the network launched in 1980. He has covered a wide range of stories over the last 25 years, from the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the first Gulf War.

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The Cole Inquiry, formally the Inquiry into certain Australian companies in relation to the UN Oil-For-Food Programme, was a Royal Commission established by the Australian government pursuant to the Royal Commissions Act 1902 to investigate "whether decisions, actions, conduct or payments by Australian companies mentioned in the Volcker Inquiry into the United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme breached any Federal, State or Territory law."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Iraq</span> Country in West Asia

Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia and a core country in the geopolitical region known as the Middle East. With a population of over 46 million, it is the 35th-most populous country. A federal parliamentary republic, it consists of 18 governorates. Iraq is bordered by Turkey to the north, Saudi Arabia to the south, Iran to the east, the Persian Gulf and Kuwait to the southeast, Jordan to the southwest, and Syria to the west. The capital and largest city is Baghdad. Iraqi people are diverse; mostly Arabs, as well as Kurds, Turkmen, Yazidis, Assyrians, Armenians, Mandaeans, Persians and Shabakis with similarly diverse geography and wildlife. Most Iraqis are Muslims – minority faiths include Christianity, Yazidism, Zoroastrianism, Mandaeism, Yarsanism and Judaism. The official languages of Iraq are Arabic and Kurdish; others also recognized in specific regions are Turkish, Suret, and Armenian.

The Oil-for-Food Program Hearings were held by the U.S Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations beginning in 2004 to investigate abuses of the United Nations (UN) Oil-for-Food Programme in which the economically sanctioned country of Iraq was intended to be able to sell limited amounts of oil in exchange for vital food and medicine for its population.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Theo James</span> English actor (born 1984)

Theodore Peter James Kinnaird Taptiklis, known professionally as Theo James, is an English actor. He gained recognition for playing Tobias Eaton in The Divergent Series film trilogy (2014–2016). He has starred in the horror films Underworld: Awakening (2012) and Underworld: Blood Wars (2016) and the science fiction film Archive (2020).

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Jean-Bernard Mérimée is a former French diplomat. In 2005 he admitted to accepting bribes in connection to the Oil-for-Food Program.

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Michael Soussan is a Danish-born reporter, writer and whistleblower. He lives in Los Angeles, California.

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References

  1. ↑ "Backstabbing for Beginners (2018)". Box Office Mojo . IMDb. 2018. Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  2. ↑ "Backstabbing for Beginners: A Crash Course in International Diplomacy by Michael Soussan". The Bologna Institute for Policy Research. Archived from the original on 29 May 2018. Retrieved 28 May 2018.
  3. ↑ Copenhagen Film Fund (17 May 2016). "Backstabbing for Beginners". cphfilmfund.com. Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  4. ↑ Evry, Max (21 January 2016). "Theo James Replaces Josh Hutcherson in Backstabbing for Beginners". comingsoon.net. Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  5. ↑ McNary, Dave (2 March 2016). "Jacqueline Bisset Joins Thriller 'Backstabbing for Beginners'". Variety . Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  6. 1 2 Carstensen, Ivar (22 February 2016). "Hollywood Stars Coming to Denmark to Film New Movie". DR.dk (in Danish). Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  7. ↑ Ford, Rebecca (7 June 2017). "A24, DirecTV Take 'Backstabbing for Beginners' With Theo James, Ben Kingsley (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter . Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  8. ↑ "Conspiracy, corruption, bravery and a dash of romance- don't miss the new movie "Backstabbing For Beginners"". Your Danish Life. 18 January 2018. Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  9. ↑ Boone, Josh (20 March 2018). "Murder, the Mafia and Political Corruption Abound in 'Backstabbing for Beginners' Trailer (Exclusive)". Entertainment Tonight . Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  10. ↑ "Backstabbing for Beginners". Danish Film Institute (in Danish). Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  11. ↑ "Backstabbing for Beginners". Rotten Tomatoes . Fandango . Retrieved 10 October 2021.
  12. ↑ "Backstabbing for Beginners". Metacritic . CBS Interactive . Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  13. ↑ Scheck, Frank (27 April 2018). "'Backstabbing for Beginners': Film Review". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 10 March 2021.
  14. ↑ Kiang, Jessicsa (23 March 2018). "Film Review: 'Backstabbing for Beginners'". Variety .
  15. ↑ Rechtshaffen, Michael (26 April 2018). "Review: U.N. intrigue and corruption in 'Backstabbing for Beginners'". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved 10 March 2021.
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