“Breach”–this is the reason we need to ID alcoholics.
The Quiet Egomaniac
The greatest portrayal ever of why we need to identify alcoholism
“Breach,” the movie about FBI Agent Robert Hanssen (now out on DVD), who for two decades sold U.S. secrets to the Soviets and, later, Russia, is great storytelling with acting to match. It’s also the best explanation ever on the big screen with the poignant answer to the question, why should we bother identifying someone as a likely alcoholic?
Reviewers uniformly praised director and co-writer Billy Ray for avoiding psychobabble to explain Hanssen, played by Chris Cooper in what should be an Oscar-winning role. Yet Ray presents not only behavioral clues of alcoholism in the form of a nasty, haughty, egocentric Hanssen at work who charmed his way into the good graces of his family, but also in heavy drinking before the set-up for the final drop leading to his arrest. It was enough to suggest alcoholism in someone who no doubt hid it from everyone–and who, therefore, may have drunk himself to oblivion every night after the family was sound asleep. Many spouses have been on the receiving end of such alcoholism, taking decades to uncover late-night drinking, as recounted in stories in Drunks, Drugs & Debits.
Hanssen, who was finally arrested February 20, 2001, feigned a pious Catholicism. He was the former head of the Soviet analytical unit and the FBI’s most knowledgeable expert on Russian intelligence. He was also the best the agency had on information technology and safeguarded the bureau’s IT system from cyber-terrorism. All the while, using the most basic clues in How to Spot Hidden Alcoholics, we would have identified him as untrustworthy within the first minute or two of on-screen dialogue. From the start, Hanssen was gruff, knew it all and exhibited an inordinately large sense of self-importance and a “rules don’t apply to me” attitude. He tells his new underling, Eric O’Neill (expertly played by Ryan Phillippe), “Requisition forms are for bureaucrats” after Eric objected when asked to go snatch a new computer. He uses subtle belittling techniques experienced by many if not most underlings of alcoholic bosses, telling O’Neill when they meet, “Your name is clerk. My name is Sir.” Hanssen tells O’Neill, “You are as dumb as a bag of hammers,” and then asks, “Do you pray the Rosary every day? You should.” He emphasizes department rules regarding alcohol, explaining “It’s against bureau policy for an agent to consume alcohol, even off duty…because an FBI agent is never off duty.” But then, we already learned the rules are not for him.
The hypocrisy is also blatant in regards to sex. After seeing the married O’Neill eye a woman in an elevator he says, “God expects you to live your faith at all times. Besides, I disapprove of women in pants suits. Men wear pants.” In the meantime, he sends secretly made tapes of he and his wife in bed to strangers who reciprocate in kind. Moral rules don’t apply to Robert Hanssen, either.
The agent in charge of placing O’Neill in Hanssen’s office, Kate Burroughs (Laura Linney in a great role), did so under the guise that he needed to be outed for sexual deviancy. She is forced to let O’Neill in on everything only after he shares his doubts about a case against someone who “doesn’t drink, goes to mass every day and whose family loves him.” She explains that the FBI already knows he is a traitor but needs proof of the sort that can be used in court to set him up for the death penalty. He had given away military and intelligence secrets, including our continuity of government program in case of nuclear attack. He gave away the lives of an unknown number of FBI agents. And oh yes, the sexual stories are true, too; rough sex and a fan of strippers and porn. But the grandkids do love him.
The deeper significance of several scenes will likely be missed by most viewers. Nothing is more ego-satisfying than putting down someone or something far grander, bigger and more powerful than oneself. Along these lines, he inflates his ego when likening the U.S. to a powerfully built but retarded child, potentially dangerous but young, immature and easily manipulated. Hanssen tells the photographer taking his 25-year retirement picture (he was due to retire two months after the set-up began) that he can’t take the photo because it’s not how he dresses every day–there’s a spot on his tie, which is imperceptible to anyone but him. James Graham in The Secret History of Alcoholism pointed out that many alcoholics are perfectly coifed at all times, since looking good allows for greater ease in controlling others. After Hanssen walks out on the photographer session, he degrades him, calling him a faggot. He takes as a personal affront and power play when someone at the CIA can’t see him for a prearranged appointment; when O’Neill doesn’t see it that way, Hanssen explains, “That’s why you’re still a clerk.”
When the beginning of the end approaches, Kate Burroughs asks O’Neill, “How drunk did he sound?” The implication is she knew something about his drinking and Billy Ray, the filmmaker, may have known enough to realize this was relevant to explain the character’s motives. Hanssen also tells O’Neill, with a bottle of booze on the seat between them, “I like to park at night,” suggesting that the drinking may frequently occur on drives to the nearby Rock Creek Park. O’Neill somehow knows to challenge his ego to get him to make the one final drop the FBI needs to insure the death penalty. After the arrest, the agent in charge, Dean Plesac (Dennis Haysbert, in an understated role) suggests to Hanssen that he at least tell the FBI why he did it; it’ll buy some goodwill, like it did for another turncoat agent before him. Hanssen responds that the answer was easy, because the only thing the other agent cared about was the money. “Why else would he have done it?” Plesac naively asks. Hanssen, who took only a few hundred thousand dollars for secrets that were worth at a minimum tens of millions to the Soviets, gives one of the greatest egomaniacal responses ever: “It’s not so hard to guess, is it? Considering the human ego…can you imagine sitting in a room with a bunch of your colleagues…everybody trying to guess the identity of a mole. And all the while, it’s you they’re after…you they’re looking for. That must be very satisfying, don’t you think? Or, maybe he considered himself a patriot; maybe he saw it as his duty to show us how lax our security was–we can’t rule that out as a possibility.” And egomania is almost always rooted in alcoholism.
We expect excitement when watching spies like James Bond, but would never dream the gritty halls of the FBI building could provide such suspense. Thanks to an extraordinary piece of filmmaking by Billy Ray, the movie manages to avoid even one dull moment–even better for the few of us aware of the likely underlying impetus for treasonous behaviors.