A HOLLYWOOD thriller about human rights is not exactly a brief that makes the heart sing. But at least The Interpreter offers something more meaty and topical than the pulling power of its glittering parts. Nicole Kidman and Sean Penn are the main cogs in this fiendishly convoluted drama about conspiracy and revenge.

Zuwanie (Earl Cameron), a tinpot dictator from the fictional African republic of Matobo, is due to address the United Nations in New York. Kidman’s job as a humble interpreter is to translate Zuwanie’s lies. Penn’s job as a CIA agent is to whisk the power-crazed president in and out of the country as quickly as possible. If Zuwanie were to be murdered on American soil the consequences would be unthinkable.

These are daunting challenges for two of Hollywood’s most high-minded thesps. Kidman is required to keep a straight face while speaking fluent gibberish. Penn’s unlikely remit is to hunt down villains with a badge and a loaded gun. This is not the natural metier of either actor. The novelty is how valiantly they cope.

The alarm bells start to ring when Kidman accidentally overhears a plot to assassinate Zuwanie in the chamber of the UN. The twist is that Penn doesn’t believe her, and his hunches are famously right. There’s something fishy about this ice-maiden’s evidence and altruism. Her idealistic faith in the powers of the UN doesn’t square with her rotten African past. She has murky links with dodgy activists, and enough personal reasons to crucify Zuwanie herself.

But Penn has no option but to guard his suspect when a well-heeled African hitman puts bullet holes through her shower curtain.

The race to nail the assassin could have been lifted from The Day of the Jackal. But Sydney Pollack’s sprawling thriller has none of the clean lines or pristine logic of Fred Zinnemann’s polished gem. For a film so worthily concerned with African issues, the intelligence is positively shocking. At one bizarre briefing, a CIA officer coolly informs his team that Africa is basically run by genocidal maniacs who specialise in military coups, ethnic cleansing and endemic corruption. Nobody turns a hair.

Pollack’s idea of how foreign leaders spend their downtime in New York might also raise a few eyebrows.

“Ma’am, please don’t touch the prime minister,” growls CIA agent Catherine Keener while peeling a naked lap dancer off an oriental premier.

The director makes far better use of the film’s unprecedented access to the United Nations building. There’s a brief, surreal image of delegates and translators speaking in tongues that brings to mind a hellish picture of a modern Tower of Babel.

Ultimately, there is no real argument about where the main conflict in The Interpreter lies. Forced to share each other’s company, Kidman and Penn simmer with suspicion. She clings desperately to her secrets; he tries to extract them like teeth. The battle of wills melts into the most constipated screen romance I have ever seen. Both ache for intimacy — at least Penn does — but they dare not touch. Needless to say this melancholy torture is wildly out of synch with the hectic plot. But at least it makes more sense than the baffling conspiracy.

Explore Film

• Film Reviews

• Trailers

• DVD

• London Film Festival

Editor's choice

• The 100 Best Films of the Decade
• 70 facts you didn't know about Marvel
• The 50 Biggest Movies Of 2010