Producers: Sidney Kimmell, Matt Aragachi, Christopher Hammond, Tyler Zacharia, John Logan Pierson and Michael Russell Gunn   Director: Michael Russell Gunn   Screenplay: Michael Russell Gunn   Cast: Jeff Daniels, Jared Harris, J.K. Simmons, Hope Davis, Branka Katić, Aya Cash, Guy Burnet, John Ross Bowie, Adrian Rawlins, Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson, Vladimir Kulich, Stephen Brennan and Catherine Burdon   Distributor: Angel Studios

Grade: C

The thesis of Michael Russell Gunn’s film is that the two-day Reykjavík Summit of October 1986 between U.S. President Ronald Reagan and U.S.S.R. General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev, seen at the time as a failure, was actually a critical moment in the Cold War—the point when the two nations finally stepped back from the policy of nuclear brinkmanship that had prevailed since the 1950s based on the doctrine of mutually assured destruction, leading to agreements that saw the countries reducing their nuclear arsenals, and ultimately to the collapse of the Soviet Union.

But Gunn goes further, accepting the idea advanced by some that it was Reagan’s policy of putting economic pressure on the U.S.S.R. that forced Gorbachev to the table and ultimately destroyed what he called an evil empire based on a communist system that was the enemy of human freedom, which he held as a sacred good.

There’s some validity to this idea, but it’s not really compatible with the reality that the 1986 summit floundered, despite extraordinary progress made in outlining the possibility of arms reduction, over Reagan’s intransigence about his pet project, the Strategic Defense Initiative, an elaborate, space-based system to protect against incoming ballistic missiles that was eventually determined to be impractical and scrapped, though elements of it survived in more modern form (even if, as Kathryn Bigelow’s “A House of Dynamite” recently argued, the result is hardly foolproof).  It also waves aside the intricacy of twentieth century history and the contributions of others—not least Gorbachev, who’s here painted as someone Reagan plays brilliantly, in the unravelling of the Soviet system, which had been in decline for decades.

But the script nonetheless paints the meeting as a triumph for Reagan because it secured a victory on the issue of human rights: a visa for a visit to the U.S. for the sister of cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich, who had defected in 1974.  All it took was a small concession—the president’s promise not to allow her to defect during the U.S. stay.  And that proved a modest crack in the wall of Soviet mistrust and intransigency that inexorably expanded, resulting in the liberation of the Soviet satellite states and the collapse of the U.S.S.R.    

The problem is that in casting the fall of communism as a Reagan accomplishment, Gunn has oversimplified the complexity of a long historical process in a film that’s basically just one more chapter of Thomas Carlyle’s Great Man theory of history, reductive in the extreme.

If one sets that aside (something that’s admittedly difficult to do), how does “The Brink of War” measure up as drama?  Well, even the title raises questions.  The U.S. and the U.S.S.R. had definitely been on the brink of nuclear war in 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, but by 1986 they had gradually fallen into a relationship of muted animosity that, despite the continued Soviet presence in Afghanistan and other localized disputes, hardly put them at the point of launching missiles at each other.  They just had amassed too many missiles with nuclear warheads, and as “Dr. Strangelove” had hilariously warned, accidents could happen. The 1986 summit did open the door to mitigating, if not solving, that sobering fact.

And with his access to transcripts of the Reagan-Gorbachev meetings and other documentary evidence, Gunn has fashioned a credible paraphrase of the arguments the two sides made.  The sessions in a small room—the actual site of the 1986 meeting at Höfði outside Reykjavik (which doesn’t give production designer Gunnar Palsson much to do), are necessarily claustrophobic to a degree, but Gunn, cinematographer Magdalena Gorka and editors Mike Sale and Laura Yanovich choose the shots with sufficient variety to avoid tedium.

They’re given some verve, too, by the performances of Jeff Daniels and Jared Harris.  In truth Daniels doesn’t look, or sound, much like Reagan, but he has mastered some mannerisms—his characteristic gait and tilt of the head, usually with a “Well”—that are spot on.  Harris brings a hint of stiffness to Gorbachev that’s quite effective.  But it must be admitted that Gunn has fashioned their back-and-forths to favor Reagan, so Daniels has the greater opportunity to shine. Even Austin Wintory’s score swoons when he’s on screen.

It’s when the action moves outside the conference room that problems arise, both of speculation and melodramatics.  The episodes featuring Secretary of State George Shultz, played in reliably no-nonsense fashion by J.K. Simmons as another sort American hero, the establishment fellow who’s come to admire Reagan for his sense of principle but is nonetheless willing to prod him with a good suggestion when an opening occurs (here, at least, he’s the one who contrives the Rostropovich compromise), are fine if rather obvious. 

But elsewhere things plummet. Reagan’s brief exchanges with his other advisors—Ken Adelman (John Ross Bowie), Max Kampelman (Adrian Rawlins), Richard Perle (Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson) and Paul Nitze (Stephen Brennan)—are mostly used to show his jovial side, and his phone calls with Nancy (Hope Davis), who chose to stay in Washington, are too cute for comfort.  Even worse are the intimate moments between Gorbachev and his wife Raisa (Branka Katić), who’s come along with her husband and is determined to show off her wardrobe in outdoor excursions with the international press.   That leads to some truly excruciating scenes with a couple of obnoxious reporters, Cleo (Aya Cash) of NPR and Alexander (Guy Burnet) of The Times.  Almost as bad is the digression about how Nancy Reagan, upset that Raisa is stealing the spotlight, upstages her rival long-distance with an announcement of an initiative on breast cancer.

But even those scenes pale beside those set in the basement, where operatives from the CIA and the KGB are awkwardly thrown together.  As the chiefs of the two groups watch bemusedly, their people toss verbal insults at one another more on-the-nose that those Reagan and Gorbachev deliver in their most animated moments.  Even here, though, Gunn can’t close the sidebar out without a note of détente.      

In the final analysis, “The Break of War” is about on the level of those TV movies and mini-series that networks once made about World War II figures like Churchill, Roosevelt, Mussolini and Stalin.  It’s not bad, and may serve a useful educational function when knowledge of American history has become so limited; teachers will probably find it a useful tool to plug up gaps in their class schedules.

But its determination to punch up Reagan’s reputation at a time when it’s depreciated even in the party that once venerated him throws its accuracy and balance into question.