George Clooney plays a military officer who leads a team to find stolen nuclear weapons involving participants from the new Russia and Bosnia. Nicole Kidman is a nuclear scientist working with him. She's the voice and Clooney is the muscle in carrying out the mission. The film's first half hour is rather difficult to follow as the characters introduced to the audience are secondary and remain that way for the entire movie. Oddly enough, I had the precarious feeling I was watching the set up to a James Bond movie and that I had seen it all before. The American government, using their satellite tracking devices from outer space, learn of the dilema and proceed to stop it. Their search takes them to many places and the film's climax takes place back in America.

Director Mimi Leder and screenwriter Michael Schiffer work on a similar parallel in using extreme violence in many circumstances to make their point and what makes 'The Peacemaker' an acceptable thriller is that both leads (Clooney and Kidman) maintain an impressive and equal amount of talent in proceeding to save the world. Neither one of their characters is above the other and I thought that was appropriate. Unfortunately, this first effort from Dreamworks takes its audience for granted most of the time and that is a disappointing start for the new studio.