Master Spy: The Robert Hanssen Story (2002) is a made-for-television movie based on the story of Robert Hanssen, who was charged with and convicted of selling American secrets to the Soviet Union. It was written by Norman Mailer and directed by Lawrence Schiller.
 | This article needs an improved plot summary.(July 2023) |
The film depicts abuse perpetrated by Howard Hanssen, Robert Hanssen's father, against Robert. According to Hal Boedeker of the Orlando Sentinel , the events are intended to have viewers sympathize with Hanssen. [1]
According to Boedeker, the film "lingers over his sexual peccadilloes". [1]
Master Spy: The Robert Hanssen Story was filmed in Moscow, Hong Kong, Hawaii, Toronto, and Washington, D.C. [2] [3]
The film was produced by Oakdale Productions and 20th Century Fox Television, and was distributed by Fox Television. The executive producers of the film were Norman Mailer and Lawrence Schiller, the producer was Kay Hoffman, the director was Lawrence Schiller, and the writer was Norman Mailer. [2]
Master Spy: The Robert Hanssen Story received reviews from publications including Variety, The A.V. Club , the Tampa Bay Times , DVD Talk , the San Francisco Chronicle , and Christopher Null of Filmcritic.com . [2] [4] [5] [6]
Phil Gallo, writing for Variety, wrote that the film was "A psychological drama that fails to haunt, intrigue or even repel its audience, “Master Spy” is a slowly told, drawn-out examination of an FBI agent who fights the demons of his upbringing, Catholicism and unbearable financial debt. Robert Hanssen’s story of how he came to sell FBI documents to the KGB is more background than plot as scribe Norman Mailer and director Lawrence Schiller stick with the double spy’s family life as the crux of this four-hour mini. William Hurt delivers a consistent performance as the droll, slightly base Hanssen and Mary-Louise Parker is excellent at living within the skin of his devoutly Catholic wife, Bonnie. Over four hours covering 33 years, we see little change in the Hanssens — their dedication to each other never wavers, they maintain traditional roles in the home and religion is their big fallback." [2]
An article in the Tampa Bay Times noted that the film left out some elements of Hanssen’s life. [5]
Robert Philip Hanssen was an American Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent who spied for Soviet and Russian intelligence services against the United States from 1979 to 2001. His espionage was described by the Department of Justice as "possibly the worst intelligence disaster in U.S. history".
Earl Edwin Pitts is a former FBI special agent who was convicted of espionage for selling information to Soviet and Russian intelligence services.
Isidor Feinstein "I. F." Stone was an American investigative journalist, writer, and author.
Karl František Koecher is a Czech mole known to have penetrated the CIA during the Cold War.
Oleg Danilovich Kalugin is a former KGB general. He was during a time, head of KGB political operations in the United States and later a critic of the agency. After being convicted of spying for the West in absentia during a trial in Moscow, he remained in the US and was sworn in as a citizen on 4 August 2003.
Plato Cacheris was an American lawyer. He was known as one of Washington D.C.'s premier defense lawyers, particularly prominent in political scandals.
Lis Wiehl is a New York Times bestselling American author of fiction and nonfiction books, and a legal analyst. She is the author of twenty books, including, most recently, A Spy in Plain Sight: The Inside Story of the FBI and Robert Hanssen―America's Most Damaging Russian Spy, published by Pegasus Books.
Victor Ivanovich Cherkashin is a former Soviet foreign counter-intelligence officer of the PGU KGB SSSR. He was the case officer for both Aldrich Ames, a CIA counter-intelligence officer, and Robert Hanssen, an FBI agent.
Lawrence Julian Schiller is an American photojournalist, film producer, director and screenwriter.
David A. Vise, is a journalist and author. He is a Senior Advisor to New Mountain Capital, a New York–based investment firm, and Executive Director of Modern States “Freshman Year for Free,” a philanthropy whose goal is to make college more accessible and affordable.
Breach is a 2007 American spy thriller film directed by Billy Ray, who wrote the screenplay with Adam Mazer and William Rotko. The film is based on the true story of Robert Hanssen, an FBI agent convicted of spying for the Soviet Union and later Russia for more than two decades. It stars Chris Cooper as Hanssen and Ryan Phillippe as Eric O'Neill, the FBI Investigator who helped bring about his downfall. The film received generally positive reviews and grossed $41 million on a $23 million budget.
The Special Collection Service (SCS), codenamed F6, is a highly classified joint U.S. Central Intelligence Agency–National Security Agency program charged with inserting eavesdropping equipment in difficult-to-reach places, such as foreign embassies, communications centers, and foreign government installations. Established in the late 1970s and headquartered in Beltsville, Maryland, the SCS has been involved in operations ranging from the Cold War to the Global War on Terrorism.
Eric Michael O'Neill is an American former FBI counter-terrorism and counterintelligence operative. He worked as an Investigative Specialist with the Special Surveillance Group (SSG) and played a major role in the arrest, conviction, and imprisonment of FBI agent Robert Hanssen for spying on behalf of the Soviet Union and Russia. His book written about this experience, Gray Day: My Undercover Mission to Expose America's First Cyber Spy, was published in spring 2019. He is a public speaker and security expert who lectures internationally about espionage and national security, cybersecurity, fraud, corporate diligence and defense, hacking, and other topics.
Felix Bloch is a former director of European and Canadian Affairs in the United States Department of State. He is known for his connection to the Robert Hanssen espionage case.
Louis Joseph Freeh is an American attorney and former judge who served as the fifth Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation from September 1993 to June 2001.
Robert Stephen Lipka was a former army clerk at the National Security Agency (NSA) who, in 1997, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit espionage and was sentenced to 18 years in prison. He was arrested more than 30 years after his betrayal, as there is no statute of limitations for espionage.
David Wise was an American journalist and author who worked for the New York Herald-Tribune in the 1950s and 1960s, and published a series of non-fiction books on espionage and US politics as well as several spy novels. His book The Politics of Lying: Government Deception, Secrecy, and Power (1973) won the George Polk Award, and the George Orwell Award (1975).
Gray Day: My Undercover Mission to Expose America's First Cyber Spy is a 2019 non-fiction book by Eric O'Neill, published by Crown Books, about his mission to collect evidence against Robert Hanssen, an employee of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) who spied for Russia.
Spy: The Inside Story of How the FBI's Robert Hanssen Betrayed America is a 2002 non-fiction book by David Wise. It is about the Robert Hanssen case.
 | This article related to an American TV movie is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
 | This espionage-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
