“The Debt” is basically just set up like a typical suspense-thriller film, but it has a nice flow and a few unique aspects that help make it more interesting and entertaining. Most of the movie consists of gritty, dramatic, dreary scenes, but director John Madden did a good job of giving it spice by mixing in some sleek and stealthy situations that are typical to spy movies.

The story starts off in 1997 and focuses on three retired Israeli secret agents, but it revolves more around their mission from 1966: to capture and bring to justice the Nazi Surgeon of Birkena (Jesper Christensen). The trio of agents, Stephan Gold (Tom Wilkinson), David Peretz (Ciaran Hinds) and Rachel Singer (Helen Mirren), are all busy attempting to live happily ever after when karma dishes up a big helping of what-goes-around-comes-around, and they realize that they’re Nazi-related troubles may not be finished due to an unsettled debt from decades ago.

The movie then proceeds to transition back in time, to when they were all much younger and pleasing to the eye. Young Rachel (Jessica Chastain) meets her two new partners, young Stephan (Marton Csokas) and young David (Sam Worthington), and they get right to work getting in close to the sinister Doctor Bernhardt, also known as the Surgeon of Birkenau, by setting up gynecologist appointments for Rachel. The movie proceeds through a few of the appointments with the Surgeon and a handful of stylish action scenes at break-neck speed, and before the viewer knows it the Surgeon is sitting tied and gagged on their apartment floor. So . . . mission success?  The following scenes are definitely  awkward and tense as the agents have to get uncomfortably close to the sinister murderer that they are living with in order to keep him alive for trial.

Since the movie concentrates on both their 1966 mission and their retired lives afterwards, there are numerous plot jumps between decades, which can often ruin a movie if not done with care. Fortunately, Madden is a caring man and managed to make it all run smoothly, especially considering the film’s high number of transitions.

The movie’s focal character is Rachel, the lone female in the trio of agents. Both actresses who played the part did an excellent job of stealing the show, but  Mirren is particularly great to watch. The role of “old, retired hero being called back to action” is usually played by actors such as Bruce Willis or Mel Gibson, but Mirren steps up to the plate and shows that aging actresses can get the job done just as efficiently – and in a skirt. This uncommon dosage of grandma-is-a-badass helps this film earn a few more entertainment points.

But viewer’s should not forget Chastain’s performance; she does an excellent job of playing the young, pretty-but-lethal Rachel, fresh on her first mission in the field. Chastain gets considerably more screen time than Mirren, so the audience has a better chance to get to know her version of Rachel better, allowing the movie to get a firmer grip on the audience during the movie’s darker, tenser scenes.

The movie’s two-hour runtime allows for everything to fit into the film without anything feeling left out or crammed. Everything seems to flow rather flawlessly, and it certainly succeeds in maintaining the audience’s interests and keeping them asking what will happen next.

Overall, “The Debt” is a decently good movie for anyone who is a fan of the suspense-thriller genre, or in the mood for a good ol’ Nazi hunt.

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“The Debt”

Starring: Helen Mirren, Jessica Chastain, Sam Worthington and Tom Wilkinson

Rated R for some violence and language

Rating: A-