---
title: "Enemy of the State"
year: 1998
kind: "film"
canonical: "https://film.one/film/enemy-of-the-state"
fi1m_id: "enemy-of-the-state"
imdb_id: "tt0120660"
tmdb_id: 9798
wikidata_id: "Q177930"
fi1m_score: 73
critics_score: 69
critics_reviews: 9
published: "2026-10-05T01:23:35.101827+00:00"
updated: "2026-10-05T01:23:35.406976+00:00"
region: "IT"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# Enemy of the State (1998)

Directed by Tony Scott · 2h 12m · Action, Drama, Thriller

## Identity

Enemy of the State

- **Canonical:** https://film.one/film/enemy-of-the-state
- **Type:** Film
- **Fi1m ID:** enemy-of-the-state
- **IMDb ID:** tt0120660
- **TMDB ID:** 9798
- **Wikidata ID:** Q177930
- **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120660/, https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/9798, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q177930

**Fi1m score: 73** · Critics 69 from 9 reviews

*In a sentence:* Washington is under total surveillance and, by some miracle, every camera has a cinematographer

> Tony Scott’s surveillance thriller borrows its anxieties from better films and its energy from nowhere but itself. Loud, quick and shallow, it is a good deal of fun, chiefly because Gene Hackman arrives and refuses to be hurried.

## Synopsis

Washington, D.C., in the week before Christmas. Robert Clayton Dean (Will Smith) is a labour lawyer with a wife, Carla (Regina King), a young son and a case against a union boss. Across town a congressman who opposes a new surveillance bill is murdered beside a lake on the orders of Reynolds (Jon Voight), an official at the National Security Agency, and a wildlife researcher, Daniel Zavitz (Jason Lee), has a camera pointed at the water. Running for his life, Zavitz slips the recording into Dean’s shopping bag in a lingerie shop. Within a day Dean’s credit cards are dead, his firm has let him go and his face is in the newspaper beside an ex-girlfriend, Rachel Banks (Lisa Bonet). His only lead is a name she gives him: Brill.

## Review

Tony Scott’s *Enemy of the State* takes the paranoid thriller of the 1970s, the one where a decent man learns the government is listening, and bolts on the toys of 1998: satellites that zoom to a rooftop, telephones that give away your position, a transmitter sewn into a trouser cuff. David Marconi’s script has one idea, that this could happen to anyone, and it tests the idea on the most likeable man in America. The result is loud, quick and not deep, and we had a good time.

Will Smith plays Robert Clayton Dean, a Washington labour lawyer who talks for a living and keeps talking when the ground goes from under him. Smith’s gift here is to stay funny while frightened, so that a man explaining to his wife why his face is in the paper beside another woman’s is both a joke and a real alarm. Regina King’s Carla has been telling him for years that the government watches everyone, and when she turns out to be right the film gives her too little to do about it. Lisa Bonet, as the ex-girlfriend Rachel Banks, is the link to a source who calls himself Brill, and plays the awkwardness between old lovers more honestly than the script asks.

Dan Mindel shoots Washington in two colours. Dean’s home is amber and lamp-lit; the agency floor is blue and green and glass, and the satellite views that swoop down on streets and roofs carry a grain, as if we were watching through the machine. Chris Lebenzon cuts between the thing happening and the screens on which it is seen, so that we are in two places and safe in neither. Benjamín Fernández gives the agency a floor of monitors and gives Brill a warehouse lined in copper mesh, the one room in the city nothing can see into. Trevor Rabin and Harry Gregson-Williams keep a pulse running under all of it, which is one reason 132 minutes feel shorter than they are.

Then there is Gene Hackman. Brill is a retired intelligence man who has not trusted a telephone in decades, and Hackman plays him with a tired contempt for everyone, Dean included. He played a surveillance man once before, in Francis Ford Coppola’s [*The Conversation*](https://film.one/film/the-conversation) (1974), and the film knows it and does not pretend otherwise. There is a scene in which Brill tells Dean, item by item, what the agency has on him, and we felt a cold, slightly pleasurable dread, the sort you feel when a stranger reads your own address back to you. It lasted about five minutes. Then the film went back to running, because Scott is not interested in dread for its own sake.

Jon Voight plays Reynolds, the man who orders a congressman’s death before the opening titles and then spends the rest of the film managing staff. It is a good, dry turn: a civil servant with a problem rather than a monster. His young men, Hicks (Loren Dean), Krug (Jake Busey) and Pratt (Barry Pepper), talk like a help desk and shoot like a militia, and the film is funny about the gap. Jason Lee’s Daniel Zavitz, the wildlife researcher whose camera records the killing, gets the first act’s best stretch, a run across traffic that Lebenzon cuts to the bone.

What the film does not have is a thought about surveillance beyond the plain one, that it is bad when it is aimed at you. The agency’s powers switch on and off as the plot needs them. The last half hour takes a turn we will not describe, except to say that a film about watching becomes a film about shooting. We enjoyed it too much to mind at the time, and minded a little on the way home.

Set against Scott’s own *Crimson Tide* (1995), which put Hackman in a smaller room with larger stakes, this is the lighter film by some distance, and it knows it. Watch it with someone who will say “that is not how satellites work” and then stop saying it twenty minutes in.

*Fi1m score 73, published 5 October 2026.*

## What the critics say

Most critics like Enemy of the State as a fast, noisy chase thriller and do not ask much more of it. Six of the nine reviews are positive, and the praise clusters in two places: Tony Scott’s direction, which several reviewers credit with keeping the paranoia moving at a sprint, and the two leads. Will Smith is found charismatic and funny, and Gene Hackman’s tense, dry presence is singled out again and again, even by critics who are otherwise unimpressed.

The reservations are about the plot rather than the people. More than one review notes that the conspiracy story is borrowed, and Variety finds it short on the political urgency and emotional weight of the thrillers it imitates. The spread is wide: the lone negative notice, from The AV Club, calls the film competent but formulaic, with a slow opening and surveillance scenes that fail to grip.

## Straight answers

**Is Enemy of the State worth watching?**

*Enemy of the State* is worth an evening for anyone who wants a loud, quick surveillance thriller that moves rather than thinks, and we scored it 73. Will Smith stays funny while frightened, and Gene Hackman, as the retired intelligence man Brill, arrives and refuses to be hurried. It has nothing to say about surveillance beyond the plain fact that it is bad when aimed at you.

**How long is Enemy of the State, and what is it rated?**

*Enemy of the State* runs 2h 12m. It is an action and drama film.

**Where can I watch Enemy of the State in Italy?**

*Enemy of the State* is streaming on Disney+ in Italy, and it is also available to rent from Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV from €3.99. Availability is checked daily; the links above go straight to each service.

**How violent or frightening is Enemy of the State, and is it suitable for children?**

*Enemy of the State* is a 15 in the UK, and that is about right: a congressman is murdered before the opening titles, the chase is sustained, and the last half hour becomes a film about shooting. The dread is brief and more chilly than gory, so it is not frightening in the horror sense. Not for younger children; older teenagers who like action will be fine.

**How does Enemy of the State compare to The Conversation?**

*Enemy of the State* is the louder, lighter and shallower of the two, and [*The Conversation*](https://film.one/film/the-conversation) is the better film by a clear margin. Coppola's picture is quiet, sad and far more frightening, with Hackman's loneliness at its centre; Tony Scott's is a chase with satellites. Watch *Enemy of the State* for fun and *The Conversation* when you want to be unsettled.

**What should I watch after Enemy of the State?**

After *Enemy of the State*, try [*The Conversation*](https://film.one/film/the-conversation) (1974, Fi1m 92): Hackman’s first surveillance man, quieter, sadder and far more frightening than this one. Then [*Three Days of the Condor*](https://film.one/film/three-days-of-the-condor) (1975, Fi1m 80): The 1970s original of the decent man on the run from his own government; and [*The Lives of Others*](https://film.one/film/the-lives-of-others) (2006, Fi1m 84): Surveillance from the listener’s side, in East Berlin, with the dread this film skips.

### Reviews we read (9)

- **Empire**, Andrew Collins (80/100, inferred): The critic calls the film great fun, praising its stylish visual approach and sustained paranoid pace. He also singles out Gene Hackman and the offbeat supporting cast for keeping the film compelling. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/enemy-state-review/)
- **Radio Times**, Alan Jones (4/5): The review calls the thriller cracking, with plenty of edge and appeal. It praises Tony Scott’s direction and Will Smith’s central performance. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/movie-guide/b-8h01gp/enemy-of-the-state/)
- **Total Film**, Total Film (4/5): The review calls it an immensely satisfying, fast-moving chase movie despite its unoriginal plot. It praises the performances of Will Smith and Gene Hackman, along with Tony Scott’s visual flair. [Read](https://www.gamesradar.com/enemy-of-the-state-review/)
- **RogerEbert.com**, Roger Ebert (3/4): Ebert considers it an entertaining, energetic surveillance thriller. He singles out the film’s fast-paced direction and elaborate use of surveillance technology for praise. [Read](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/enemy-of-the-state-1998)
- **The New York Times**, Janet Maslin (70/100, inferred): Maslin gives the film a generally positive verdict as a lively thriller. She singles out its energetic, high-tech suspense as a strength. [Read](https://www.nytimes.com/1998/11/20/movies/film-review-the-walls-have-ears-and-eyes-and-cameras.html)
- **Time Out**, NB (64/100, inferred): The page identifies itself as a film review, but its review text is unavailable here. No critical verdict or specific praise or complaint can be established from the accessible material. [Read](https://www.timeout.com/movies/enemy-of-the-state)
- **Variety**, Emanuel Levy (60/100, inferred): Levy finds the film sporadically entertaining but lacking the political urgency and emotional resonance of classic conspiracy thrillers. He praises the performances, particularly Will Smith’s leading turn and Gene Hackman’s tense, humorous presence, while faulting the limited psychological depth. [Read](https://variety.com/1998/film/reviews/enemy-of-the-state-1200455947/)
- **The AV Club**, Keith Phipps (35/100, inferred): Phipps finds the thriller competent but underwhelming, arguing it brings little new to the paranoid-conspiracy formula. He praises Gene Hackman’s performance and the likable lead and supporting actors, while criticizing the slow start and surveillance scenes. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/enemy-of-the-state-1798195762)
- **Eye for Film**, Angus Wolfe Murray (78/100, inferred): The critic finds it an entertaining, fast-paced thriller that will keep viewers engaged. He particularly praises Will Smith’s charismatic, humorous action-hero performance and Tony Scott’s steady handling of the chase-and-conspiracy story. [Read](https://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/enemy-of-the-state-film-review-by-angus-wolfe-murray)

## Details

- **Director:** Tony Scott
- **Director:** Tony Scott
- **Writer:** David Marconi
- **Cinematography:** Dan Mindel
- **Editor:** Chris Lebenzon
- **Music:** Harry Gregson-Williams, Trevor Rabin
- **Production design:** Benjamín Fernández
- **Producer:** Jerry Bruckheimer
- **Cast:** Will Smith as Robert Clayton Dean; Gene Hackman as Brill; Jon Voight as Reynolds; Regina King as Carla Dean; Loren Dean as Hicks; Jake Busey as Krug; Barry Pepper as Pratt; Jason Lee as Daniel Zavitz
- **Runtime:** 2h 12m
- **Release (Italy):** 8 January 1999
- **Genres:** Action, Drama, Thriller
- **Budget:** $90 million
- **Box office:** $251 million

## Where to watch in Italy

- Disney+: streaming, hd
- Amazon Prime Video: rent €3.99, hd
- Apple TV: rent €3.99, hd
- Amazon Prime Video: buy €7.99, sd
- Apple TV: buy €7.99, sd

*Checked 2026-10-05.*

Also available in: AR, AT, AU, BE, BG, BR, CA, CH, CL, CO, CZ, DE, DK, EC, EE, ES, FI, FR, GB, GR, HK, HR, HU, IE, IL, IS, IT, JP, KR, LT, MX, NL, NO, NZ, PA, PE, PL, PT, RO, RS, SE, SG, SI, TR, UA, US, ZA. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country.

## If you liked this

- *The Conversation* (1974), Fi1m 92: Hackman’s first surveillance man, quieter, sadder and far more frightening than this one — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-conversation.md)
- *Three Days of the Condor* (1975), Fi1m 80: The 1970s original of the decent man on the run from his own government — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/three-days-of-the-condor.md)
- *The Lives of Others* (2006), Fi1m 84: Surveillance from the listener’s side, in East Berlin, with the dread this film skips — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-lives-of-others.md)
- *Sneakers* (1992): The same toys, a lighter touch and a better team than Reynolds ever assembled
- *Caché* (2005), Fi1m 88: A family receives tapes of their own front door; Haneke never explains the camera — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/cache.md)

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/enemy-of-the-state