‘Raqqa: Spy Vs Spy’: Seville Review

Dir: Gerardo Herrero. Spain/Morocco/Germany. 2024. 107mins

A spy thriller set in 2017 in the ISIS-controlled Syrian city of the title, Raqqa: Spy Vs Spy is a highlight in the lengthy career of Spanish director and producer Gerardo Herrero (Under Therapy, The Goya Murders). It boasts a satisfyingly snaking plotline that only starts to feel rushed over its home stretch and a grounded sense of duty towards its incendiary material — the film is based on the 2019 novel ‘Virgins And Executioners’ by Tomás Barbulo. And while the events and coincidences pile up too quickly, meaning that characters and issues who deserve more time lack depth, this efficient picture still merits international attention following its Spanish release on 22 November.

Merits international attention 

On-screen titles tell us that rule of ISIS in Raqqa (the film shot in Morocco and Casablanca), is in decine, and that Washington and Moscow are both planning to eliminate the group’s leader, known as ‘the Jordanian’. The dialogue does a good job of keeping the exposition to a minimum as we are shuttled rapidly between two stories, that of mercenary Haibala (Alvaro Morte, from Netflix series Money Heist), on the Russian side, and Malika (Mina El Hammani), a nurse/spy working, via Europol, for the US. Raqqa is a city full of foreigners who in one way or another have signed up for the ISIS cause.

The cast features a mix of Spanish and Moroccan actors, and both Morte and Hammani learned different Arabian dialects as part of the film’s aim for authenticity. Haibala, persuasively played by Morte as inscrutable, streetwise and utterly alone, is working within ISIS as a fundraiser; we first meet him negotiating the transport of cars fitted with weapons into Syria.

Once in Raqqa, and against the wishes of well-intentioned archaeologist Khaled (Ben Temple), a lonely voice of resistance, Haibala will set up appalling deals to sell the precious antiques from the Archaeological Museum to fund the war, whilst trying to locate the Jordanian’s location. In the film’s most uncomfortable scene, he finds himself having to buy a trafficked teenager, Muna (Sara Hwidar), previously a slave at the Jordanian’s house, from a line of handcuffed, burqa-wearing women. 

Meanwhile, Malika, accompanied by her friend Alia (Cristina Kovani) – a wide-eyed innocent travelling to be with her husband, a member of ISIS — has come to Raqqa to work at the ISIS hospital. As well as eliminating the Jordanian, Malika, who lives under the careful eye of the director (Fariba Sheikhan) of ISIS’ all-female police unit, will also become Alia’s protector. Inevitably but somewhat implausibly, the lives of Malika and Haibala become entwined, at which point things begin to lose their way.

Many different elements are wrapped up in the figure of Malika, who is not only acting the part of a nurse but also that of a submissive woman, but her complexity as a character is only really hinted at. She has been warned by Europol that she may have to use sex as a way of getting access to The Jordanian, opening up a world of complex issues that remain basically unaddressed in a film which prioritises its genre elements. But it still remains far more interesting in its treatment of the women than of the men, who – Haibala apart – are all, underneath their intelligence and manners, the tradition-bound, cruel and sexist animals of the popular imagination. 

While exteriors convince as war-torn Raqqa, shadowy, jumbled interiors show terrific work from production designer Mobsitte Saad and remain visually enticing despite the unfolding horrors.