When trickster meets crook

DUPLICITY is the name of the game in The Two Faces of January, a seductive, slow-burning tale of greed and desire that promises a lot more than it actually delivers. Written and directed by Hossein Amini and based on a 1960s novel by Patricia Highsmith, the film is at its heart an intriguing battle of wills between two men who are cut from the same cloth, yet far different in terms of circumstances.

"The truth is, we're joined at the hip," says the suave and savvy Chester MacFarland (Viggo Mortensen) to Rydal Keener (Oscar Isaac), a young tour guide adept at shortchanging unsuspecting tourists in Athens in 1962. Much has happened by the time he makes that remark, and the shifting dynamic between the two men is the essential ingredient that drives the movie.

Chester and his beautiful young wife Colette (Kirsten Dunst) are travelling in some style through Europe while Rydal is merely at loose ends, reluctant to return to his estranged family in the US, and still bitter at his recently deceased father for having unrealistic expectations. A chance encounter with the couple presents an opportunity to make some money and further his interest in the older man's wife.