Juan Pujol Garcia (1912-88) is quite a rarity: a subject so intriguing that he makes any documentary profile unsinkable. This outwardly unassuming Barcelona native established himself as the single most-accomplished spy of World War II with stunning rapidity and ease. Nicknamed "Garbo" as an homage to his thespian-like ability to slip from one guise to another, he was hired by the Nazis to collect British intelligence secrets, but he actually spent years as a double agent, building a bedrock of elaborate deceptions that drove the Axis powers to the point of unmitigated failure. If presented in a fictional context, the fantastic minutiae of this tale would strain the belief of even the most gullible -- from the byzantine network of imaginary transcontinental operatives that Garcia created and sustained for Germany, to his ability to distract the Nazis from the Normandy landing and reorient them toward Pas de Calais, to an aura of trustworthiness so convincing that surviving Nazis continued to pay Garcia retroactively for his wartime services despite the worthlessness of his strategic information.
If this tale sounds entertaining, it is. One need only wonder why it took decades for an enterprising filmmaker to unearth the details. Spanish director Edmon Roch can be commended for his realization of this goal, but that's about all that can be said for the director. He makes one constantly aware of the two greatest risks associated with this documentary subject: his almost impenetrably enigmatic personality and a dearth of photographs or videos of him. To compensate for the latter, the director builds the movie on an ill-advised visual foundation: clips from classic Hollywood movies such as Carol Reed's Cold War comedy Our Man in Havana and the Peter Lorre vehicle Mr. Moto's Last Warning. Roch presumably did this to reinforce the sense of Garcia as an actor, but it doesn't really work. At worst, the cutaways just add hackneyed kitsch to the tale. Granted, one could make a case that the clips help illustrate the degree to which Garcia's tale remains shrouded by the same sort of mythmaking prevalent in the spy films of the period and must be factually unearthed from that context, though the editing fails to support this transition during the second half of the film.
Equally unsettling are some weird stylistic choices that Roch makes, such as an inexplicable decision to omit the identities of his interviewees until halfway through the picture, and one particularly loathsome bit of self-indulgence that involves gradually lowering an interviewee's voice during a commentary about inaudibility. It all comes off as highly amateurish and not the slightest bit effective. One can also fault Roch for failing to disclose information regarding the final decades of Garcia's life in Venezuela (his ownership of a bookstore, for example) or the date and details of his death in the late '80s.
As indicated, though, the film is far from being an unmitigated failure. It succeeds to a surprising degree, despite the clumsy presentation, thanks to a fascinating true story. The narrative takes some time to find its footing, though by the time we get to the animated illustrations of Garcia's operative charts, the mesmerizing tale of the Normandy diversion, and Garcia's reemergence in Thatcher-era Britain, we're emotionally hooked. While one can't imagine that Garcia would be proud of the shoddy treatment afforded him here, he would likely be moved by the overall arc and sweep of his own life as played out onscreen and the film's central conviction that the Allies owed much of their success to his efforts.