Director Ariel Vromen has a history of attracting great talent to tell taut crime thrillers. His previous films include “The Iceman” with Michael Shannon, Chris Evans, and Winona Ryder and also “Criminal” which featured Kevin Costner, Ryan Reynolds, and Gal Gadot.
This time around, his cast for “The Angel” consists of some great and underappreciated actors. Toby Kebbell of “Black Mirror” and “War for the Planet of the Apes” fame stars with Hannah Ware, Marwan Kenzari, Waleed Farouq Zuaiter, Maisa Abd Elhadi, Sasson Gabay, Miki Leon, Ori Pfeffer, and Slimane Daz. Kenzari is on the cusp of a major breakout with this film and next year’s “Aladdin” live-action remake where he’ll play the villain Jafar, and obviously, that film will make another $1 billion for Disney.
The synopsis for the film can be read below.
The Angel is the true story of Ashraf Marwan, who was Egyptian President Nasser’s son-in-law, and special advisor and confidant to his successor Anwar Sadat, while simultaneously one of Israeli Intelligence’s most precious assets of the 20th century.
“Children of Men” screenwriter David Arata and Vromen are adapting the story from Uri Bar-Joseph’s bestselling novel “The Angel: The Egyptian Spy Who Saved Israel.” That kind of title definitely sets up a dramatic and tense premise that Vromen approached in a careful way.
“It’s a very interesting point of view to get into the political or militant arena and see it through the eyes of high-ranking personnel that needs to not only gather information, but risk his life to provide that information. … It makes a perfectly dramatic through-line for any kind of story.”
Vromen is doing everything to make sure that the film does Marwan’s efforts justice. With “The Angel” being shot in English, Hebrew, and Arabic, one producer said that they’d “never seen a Netflix Original with such extensive Arabic dialogue” and that it “goes to show their will to maintain the flavor and authenticity of the project.”
Netflix will premiere “The Angel” on September 14.