FFFA: Cypher (2002)

Cypher

“★★★★ Gripping stuff. It’s rare that you get a thriller that is as intelligently effective as Cypher.” – Margaret Pomeranz, The Movie Show 

“Tight as a drum, and with more twists than a Chubby Checker revival concert.” – Variety  

This twisty tech-noir thriller stars Jeremy Northam (Gosford Park, The Crown) as Morgan Sullivan, a bored accountant from America’s Midwest, dreaming of a more exciting life. He takes a job with a secretive software company called Digicorp, which hires him to spy on competitors at corporate conferences.  

On one of his assignments, Morgan meets Rita Foster (Lucy Liu, Presence, Charlie’s Angels), an enigmatic femme fatale who reveals that Digicorp is secretly brainwashing him. Questioning everything he thought he knew and feeling in over his head, Morgan finds himself led to Sunways, another Orwellian tech company and Digicorp’s main rival, which takes him on as a double agent.  

A Kafkaesque corporate espionage story with a taut script and stylish direction from Vincenzo Natali (Cube, Splice), Cypher is a cerebral, edge-of-your-seat sci-fi thriller that’s criminally underseen compared to some of its millennial sci-fi counterparts like The Matrix and Minority Report.  

Festivals & Awards
Sitges Catalonian International Film Festival 2002 – Winner, Best Actor (Jeremy Northam); Nominee, Best Film
Toronto International Film Festival 2023

Screens as part of Umbrella-Palooza: Digital Nightmares Triple Feature.

Rating

Unclassified 18+

Duration

95 min

Country

United States

Language

English

Cast

Jeremy Northam, Lucy Liu, Nigel Bennett

Director

Vincenzo Natali