The Numbers Station is a 2013 British-American action thriller film, starring John Cusack and Malin Åkerman, about a burned-out CIA black ops agent assigned to protect the code operator at a secret American numbers station somewhere in the British countryside.
The film was directed by Danish director Kasper Barfoed (four episodes of
Those Who Kill,
The Candidate,
The Lost Treasure of the Knights Templar), and the camera work was by Icelandic cinematographer Óttar Guðnason (
Love, Wedding, Marriage,
Inhale,
A Little Trip to Heaven). It was produced by brothers Sean and Bryan Furst of American Furst Films (
Daybreakers,
The Girl in the Park,
The Matador) and Nigel Thomas at British production and film finance company Matador Pictures (
Princess Ka'iulani,
Dread,
Book of Blood).
Portions of the film were shot at RAF Bentwaters, a former RAF and USAF Air Force base north-east of Ipswich in Suffolk, which was closed down in 1993. It is now known as Bentwaters Parks and has been turned into a film studio.
As a CIA operative, Emerson Kent (John Cusack)
is sent to kill a man who owns a bar. Before being killed by Kent, he
reveals he is a former agent who wanted to retire from the espionage
business. When Kent kills him and some bodyguards, a witness flees the
scene, accidentally leaving his wallet behind. Kent finds the wallet and
tracks the witness to his home, where he kills him. Kent is seen by a
woman (implied to be the man's daughter), and after contemplating
killing her, he decides to spare her life. As he leaves, he is followed
by the woman, who is then shot by Kent's boss Michael Grey (Liam Cunningham).
As Kent tries to convince Grey not to kill her, Grey strikes Kent on
the back and he falls to the ground. As Kent and the woman share a last
look at each other, Grey kills her.
Kent is then transferred to Suffolk, England to watch over a numbers station. While there, he befriends Katherine (Malin Åkerman).
Two months pass, and Kent spends his nights drinking and thinking about
the woman who was killed. On a particular Monday morning, the numbers
station comes under attack by armed men. With no way out, Kent and
Katherine barricade themselves inside. One assassin is already inside
the secure station and, after a lengthy shootout, is killed by Kent.
As Kent requests assistance, the operator tells him that it will be
four hours until help arrives, and that since the code has been
compromised, he must kill Katherine. Kent notices that Katherine has a
serious leg wound. He takes her to the medical room and dresses her
wound, and she passes out shortly afterwards.
Kent receives a second call from the operator, informing him that
help will arrive in two hours. The operator inquires whether he has
taken care of Katherine yet. Kent says he cannot confirm that, and the
operator orders him to do so immediately. Kent contemplates killing
Katherine. He pictures shooting her in the back, but that is shown to be
merely his visualisation. Kent and Katherine discover that 15
unauthorized messages were sent from their numbers station, where the
assignments could be anything from assassinations to bombings.
Kent and Katherine discover a computer with dossiers of 15 different
government officials, including Grey. The unauthorized codes are
instructions to assassinate the 15 people, and Katherine is to be
eliminated so she can't cancel the broadcasts. Kent remarks that the 15
executions, if carried out, would drastically cripple the intelligence
system: " ...you won't recognise the world when you wake up in the
morning." Kent and Katherine then talk about what they know of each
other, and Kent tells Katherine that he used to be on the receiving end
of the numbers. Katherine asks Kent if he ever thought about extricating
himself from the life that he's embroiled in. Kent tells her that he
once knew a man who put money aside and got out of the life. The agent
opened up a bar (it is revealed that he is the bartender in the opening
of the film) and lived for 37 months before he was taken out.
Kent then tricks the telephone operator by giving him a false
confirmation code. When the operator answers the phone, Kent discovers
that the operator works for the other side. Kent has Katherine lock
herself in a room and orders her not to come out. Kent then tells the
operator that he has killed Katherine, and goes to a car outside where
she has left her phone. Meanwhile, Katherine figures out the information
needed to cancel the broadcasts. She leaves the room to access the
computer in order to cancel the broadcast, and an assassin slips through
the door that Kent left open while searching for the phone. As the
assassin moves to kill Katherine, she sees him coming and attempts to
hide. The assassin shoots Katherine once in the stomach, Kent arrives
and they spar hand-to-hand. As the assailant strangles him from behind,
Kent reaches a gun and shoots the man several times, killing him.
Kent then applies pressure to Katherine's wound to stanch the
bleeding, and she passes on to him the final code needed to cancel the
broadcast, then tells him to go. Kent leaves to finish cancelling the
broadcast, as Katherine holds on. When he returns, she asks him if she's
going to die. As Kent injects her with anaesthetic to relieve her pain,
Katherine asks him if she's going to wake up. Kent says that he saw
four men get shot in the gut, and each one of them lived. She asks him
if he would ever have killed her, and he replies "no". Katherine appears
to succumb to her wound and die. Kent calls Grey and informs him that
everything is secure. When Grey asks about Katherine, Kent replies, "all
assets are retired". After Kent hangs up, he fills a bag with C4
explosive and tapes a detonator to a block of C4. He places C4 all
around the station and sets the detonator for 20.5 minutes.
Kent removes all of Katherine's jewelry and throws it on the floor.
He wraps her in a blanket and takes her to a car outside. When the car
doesn't start, Kent carries Katherine away from the station and the
building explodes behind them. Kent hijacks a car, and when the driver
repeats something Kent remembered the operator telling him -- "You
understand that, you're not a fool" -- Kent realizes that the driver is
the operator. When Kent asks him who he works for, the operator replies
that he used to work for the same people that Kent does, but he now
works for the other side, and that they are just as twisted, but they
pay a lot more. He describes how their bosses expect them to be killers,
how they complain when they can't function in that life any more, and
how their employers kill them, when they quit because of the things they
are forced to learn.
When the operator asks Kent if he stopped the broadcast, Kent says,
"yeah". The operator pulls out a gun and they both shoot each other.
Kent gets up, revealing that he was hit in the shoulder, and shoots the
operator again. Kent drives away, but starts to become drowsy from
shock, and he crashes the car.
He wakes up in the hospital and discovers that Katherine is alive.
Kent walks over to Katherine's room and, as he sits down, Grey steps in.
Kent informs him he wants to walk away alive, with Katherine, but Grey
says that she is a liability and wants her killed. Kent responds that
Katherine is who stopped the broadcast and saved Grey's life. When Grey
asks Kent what he wants, he says he wants ten days before they come
after them. Grey wants to know if he will find Kent and Katherine's
bodies at the station, and Kent tells him he will find enough to sell
the concept of their deaths. Grey agrees and, as he is leaving, he tells
Kent that "we were never here". As Emerson sits down by Katherine's
bed, she opens her eyes and they both stare at each other.
As the end credits roll, cars are shown passing over the Orwell Bridge in Ipswich at night, implying that Kent and Katherine escaped
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