SOURCE: Kauffmann, Stanley. “Stages of Mastery.” New Republic 25, no. 4502 (30 April 2001): 30-1.

In the following excerpt, Kauffmann provides a lukewarm assessment of the film version of Lakeboat, bemoaning the choices for director and cast but praising the naturalism he sees in the plot and dialogue.

Political thrillers come in two kinds. (To speak only of well-made ones: the others don't signify.) In the first kind, the intrigues are clear in every detail. In the second, the intrigues are in the main just as clear, but some of the details are too compacted and brisk to be understood; the viewer is aware only that heavy doings are in progress. The odd, amusing aspect of the difference between the two kinds is that it doesn't matter much. If the thriller is well made, the difference is fairly unimportant. The first kind is of course preferable, but the hurtle, the very shape...