Movie Review - Profile (2021)

This is another in what's becoming a growing trend or genre in filmmaking. This is what's called a "Screen Life" or a computer-screen film, which is a film that is composed entirely of what's captured on the protagonist's computer screen. Unfriended (2014) wasn't the first but it was one of the early major theatrical releases to do so. Searching (2018) was another and to me has been the better of these kinds of films. Arguably, those previous computer-screen films didn't need to be so. This one feels like it makes more sense as to why it would be all on a computer screen.

This film is based and indeed an adaptation of a non-fiction book by Anna Erelle. The book is about how a French, female journalist started communicating online with a Islamic terrorist. Because all of it took place via the Internet, looking at computer screens, it makes sense that this film would be made entirely using the computer screen that the journalist would be looking at. I didn't read the book, but I did read an excerpt from it, and it would seem that director and co-writer Timur Bekmambetov is pretty faithful to Erelle's story.

Valene Kane (Gangs of London and The Fall) stars as Amy Whittaker, a British journalist who is deciding on whether she's going to live with her boyfriend. One reason is because she can't afford to live in her current apartment by herself. She works as a freelance journalist and she hasn't been able to sell any stories to anybody. She is working with an editor on a possible story about Islamic terrorists recruiting young girls from Europe and the USA into ISIS or ISIL. Because the recruiting occurs online via Facebook, she creates a Facebook page where she pretends to be a young girl considering converting to Islam.

She's basically catfishing Islamic terrorists. If anyone is familiar with the documentary Catfish (2010) or the subsequent MTV series, then one knows that catfishing is typically a negative thing. However, in this case, Amy's catfishing is a good way to expose Islamic terrorists who are recruiting young girls and engaging often in sex trafficking of these young girls. It's clear that these terrorists are doing horrible things, including sharing videos of beheading on Facebook. Yet, it's also clear that Amy is Islamophobic or has a bias against Muslim or Arabic people, even those who aren't terrorists. This film is then set up that it's going to be a reckoning of her Islamophobia.

Shazad Latif (Star Trek: Discovery and Penny Dreadful) co-stars as Abu Bilel Al-Britani or just "Bilel." He's a British citizen of Pakistani descent who now lives in Syria. He went to Syria to join ISIS. He's basically an Islamic terrorist. He might consider himself a soldier in a war, but he says his job is killing. He starts messaging Amy who has labeled herself "Melody." He even starts video chatting with her via Skype. He's very handsome. He also comes across as very charming and engaging. He also can be funny and sweet.

There isn't a lot of in-depth stuff about the politics of Syria or the Middle East or what might be Bilel's justification for why he's fighting. We do get something that's akin to other things we've seen, such as in the TV series Homeland (2011). Airstrikes from foreign countries that have killed innocent children in Syria and elsewhere fuel a lot of the ISIS fighters. This film hints at that, but it doesn't seem to be a driving force or ultimate motivation for Bilel. Therefore, it doesn't help us to sympathize with Bilel as much as we would perhaps need for where this film is going.

What this film wants us to consider is that Amy might actually be falling in love or developing feelings for Bilel. There is a scene where Bilel tells Amy a sob story about his mother getting sick. Yet, I'm not sure that that is enough to sell this idea that she would develop romantic feelings for him. This is mainly due to the fact that the film doesn't give us an idea of what her daily life is like. For her to go to the lengths that she goes, namely her getting on a plane to meet him, this film needed to sell her feelings and her attraction more, but I think the film falls a bit short in that regard.

I'm not sure if this romance was what was in the book, but if so, I would have to believe the book explains the romance better. This film doesn't, which might be a function of the form and structure here. If that's the case, then again we see the limitations of this computer-screen film genre as it were.

Rated R for language and some disturbing images.
Running Time: 1 hr. and 45 mins.

In theaters.