By Steve Erickson

Instead of living the life of James Bond, the spy hero of Ghost Trail copes with PTSD, the result of living in exile and surviving torture.

Ghost Trail, co-written and directed by Jonathan Millet. VOD

Adam Bessa and Julia Franz Richter in a scene from Ghost Trail. Photo: Music Box Films

Ghost Trail ends where many films would begin: a man working an ordinary job, looking into the camera. The difference is that this one has spent its length hashing out the considerable pain and loneliness that infuses its protagonist’s life. This is a spy drama in the downbeat tradition of John le Carré — it doesn’t glamorize espionage. Genre elements push the narrative forward, but they mostly function as a means to frame a character study. Instead of living the life of James Bond, Ghost Trail‘s hero copes with PTSD, the result of living in exile and surviving torture.

In 2016, Hamid (Adam Bessa) is a literature professor who has escaped the ravages of Syria, where he was imprisoned, to teach in Strasbourg, France. He also works with an undercover group that tracks down fugitive war criminals from the Assad regime. Hamid never meets with other members in person; they speak to each other through a multiplayer video game that takes place in a war zone. At one point, he finds a book left by one of the members of the group in a park. It contains money and the name “Sami Hanna.” Hamid is pressed to head to Germany, but he hesitates because he believes that he’s found the man who tortured him at his university. Hamid spends the film’s first half quietly surveilling his suspect and then returning home to a darkened apartment. Hamid has no friends, his wife and daughter have been killed, and his only real social contact is his mother, who lives in a Lebanese refugee camp. Finally tracking down the man (Tawfeek Barhom) whom Hamid believes is the culprit, they have a long, ambiguous conversation in a library.

Millet’s style eschews face-to-face dialogue, apart from that important scene in the library. Ghost Trail focuses on the after-effects of imprisonment and torture. Hamid lives in a darkened apartment and imagines voices running through his head. He suffers from tinnitus. Hamid is not blind, but he engages with the world by sound, smell, and touch far more than most people. (He smells the man who may have tortured him in order to test his suspicions.) His physical challenges are the result of him having been blindfolded for his entire period in a Syrian jail. Even in the opening scene, where he’s lying in a truck of prisoners, the image is almost totally dark. The soundtrack becomes even more dominant after gunshots ring out. Let out into the desert, Hamid is dazed by the sudden sunlight.

Ghost Trail’s means of expressing psychological/physiological debilitation aren’t subtle. For example, as Hamid walks towards his target, electronic music slowly builds in volume and intensity. But the strategy is effective rather than assaultive; Millet expresses the subjectivity of a man who hasn’t fully adjusted to “normal” life. The film never presents torture onscreen but, in recordings Hamid listens to, men describe their horrific experiences in unflinching detail.

Bessa’s performance removes the cool factor from stoic masculinity. Clad in a hoodie and looking ahead with a dead-eyed stare, Hamid resembles the archetype of “God’s Lonely Man,” as seen in Paul Schrader’s films and screenplays. Like many of them, the guy is on a quest for revenge. Yet there are also crucial differences. He has a laudable political goal. He’s also working with a group of people who’ve lived through the same predicament. Of course, this does not make him any less lonely, but Ghost Trail is appalled at what was done to Hamid, a trauma that now determines his actions. The fact that so much of its dialogue is relegated to voice-over, heard over images of Hamid walking or riding on buses, enhances the powerful impact made by his alienation from himself and others.

Ghost Trail was inspired by a true story: the arrest of Kais Al-Abdallah, a Syrian man living in Germany. He went on trial for being an ISIS leader, based on the research of an underground group of Syrians, akin to the one Hamid belongs to. Despite this news hook, the specifics of the civil war are not emphasized. Millet concentrates on the price that Hamid paid. (The director is a Frenchman who has lived in Aleppo and speaks Arabic.) Ghost Trail is intrigued by the clandestine process of an underground group: a discussion about whether a suspect should be turned over to authorities, the use of an online video game to communicate without triggering algorithmic surveillance. Ultimately, the film’s plot-heavy conclusion matters far less than its powerful evocation of the noise inside Hamid’s consciousness, his inability to recover from his mental wounds.

Steve Erickson writes about film and music for Gay City News, Slant Magazine, the Nashville Scene, Trouser Press, and other outlets. He also produces electronic music under the tag callinamagician. His latest album, Bells and Whistles, was released in January 2024, and is available to stream here. He presents a biweekly freeform radio show, Radio Not Radio, featuring an eclectic selection of music from around the world.