The Amateur stars Rami Malek (probably best known for his role in Bohemian Rhapsody) as a widower. His wife, Sarah (Rachel Brosnahan), had been murdered on a trip to London and his supervisors at the CIA won’t take action. They believe there’s something more important than tracking down the killers.
The Amateur 2025 is a remake of the 1981 film of the same name. It’s also based on the Robert Littell book.
The inaction of his CIA superiors sets Charlie Heller on a crash course of death, destruction, and revenge. Even though he doesn’t have the training or insight of a CIA assassin, Charlie decides to murder the four people responsible for his wife’s death:
- Mishka Blazhic (Marc Rissmann)
- Ellish (Joseph Millson)
- Gretchen Frank (Barbara Probst)
- Horst Schiller (Michael Stuhlbarg)
One by one, Charlie tracks these men and woman down. He finds ways to take them out that don’t require him to get up close and personal. His skills as a CIA cryptographer come in handy as he finds unique ways to dispatch the people responsible.
Charlie’s mission of revenge may not be one we will follow. However, what he learns, how he reacts, and his actions can be viewed through the eyes of a leader. In doing so, you can discover leadership lessons in The Amateur.
Quotes And Leadership Lessons From The Amateur
1. Sarah:
Just this once, take a risk.
Charlie was not a risk-taker. He hated to travel, he’d stay home, and do his own thing. When Sarah was tasked with a trip to London, she tried to convince Charlie to go with her.
He refused. Even though Sarah prodded, he wouldn’t budge. In the end, Sarah told him to take a risk. He wouldn’t. And it would cost her her life.
Leaders aren’t meant to be cowards. They’re not meant to be passive.
Leaders are risk takers. They see an opportunity, they analyze it, and then they act.
Take a risk today.
2. Beware the motives of others:
The Bear (Jon Bernthal) asks Charlie what he was doing for lunch. Charlie becomes excited; he thinks The Bear wants to be friendly. That’s not what The Bear wanted.
Instead, The Bear wanted help with computer stuff. It was a business situation, not a relationship situation.
This hurt Charlie. He had misread The Bear’s motives.
We have to be aware of the motives of others. What are they trying to say to us? What are they trying to get from us? What do they really want?
On the other hand, we also have to be aware of our motives. What are we telling others? What are we trying to get from them? What are we trying to say?
Motives can be completely different from what we communicate. We must be aware of whether or not we’re clearly communicating our desires. If not, we have to change the way we communicate.
3. Leaders have to share hard news:
Director Moore (Holt McCallany) calls Charlie into Director O’Brien’s (Julianne Nicholson) office. There was something Charlie must see. There’s something he must hear.
Sarah had been murdered in London. They broke the news to Charlie as easily as they could. They showed him footage of the terrorists, the bank heist, and Sarah being taken.
News of Sarah’s death was hard to share. Yet, they did.
I hope you never have to share news as hard as the Directors did in The Amateur. That doesn’t mean you won’t have to share hard news.
Hard news may be:
- An organizational restructuring
- The passing of a coworker
- Massive layoffs
- A corporate scandal
Whatever news has to be shared, be willing to step up to share it. As a leader, you must break the hard news to those you lead.
4. Great leaders protect others:
Charlie discovers why the terrorists took Sarah. They hadn’t originally chosen her to be a hostage. There was another woman.
Sarah saw her. She jumped in front of her and took her place. She was willing to protect another woman, someone she didn’t know, at her expense.
Wow! This was a powerful scene. Seeing Sarah take the place of another hostage showed true leadership.
Too many leaders are willing to step aside and let someone else take the brunt of an attack, a missed opportunity, or a challenge. Great leaders don’t do that. Instead, they see danger and they step into it so their team members don’t have to.
Be a leader who protects others.
5. Great leaders confront wrongdoing:
Charlie had to confront Director Moore about the files he received from Inquiline (Caitríona Balfe). Inquiline had sent Charlie files on the government that did not shed a favorable light on the organization.
Not only did Charlie confront Director Moore, but he also told him how he felt. The actions of the government had been reprehensible. They were not in line with what they should be doing.
It wasn’t Charlie’s position or role to confront leadership above him. Yet, he chose to. He decided to speak up when he saw the leaders of government organizations doing wrong.
You have to be prepared for your team members to speak up. Maybe to even confront you for some of the things you’re doing that aren’t right.
Great leaders, and those becoming leaders, know they can’t let wrongdoing go without a confrontation. They have to speak up because it’s the right thing to do.
If you see something wrong, speak up. If you’re doing something wrong, allow others to speak up and to you.
Great leaders confront.
6. Charlie:
I want a fighting chance.
Charlie tells Director Moore and Caleb (Danny Sapani) that he wants training to eliminate the terrorists. If the government is not going to do it, he will.
The two look at him with a look that says he’s insane. He shouldn’t be going after these guys. They’re going to roast him.
Charlie doesn’t care if he might die. All he wants is a fighting chance.
They give him a fighting chance by sending him to Henderson (Laurence Fishburne). Henderson is a government agent who trains would-be assassins.
Your people aren’t asking for the world. They don’t want to be everything to everyone all of the time.
What do they want? They want a fighting chance to do the job they were hired to do. Sometimes, it’s challenging with the tools or resources you give them. You’re actually holding them back.
Work with your team to give them a fighting chance. You might need to offer new training, equipment, or support. Whatever you need to do, give your team a fighting chance.
7. Find the set of skills that works for your team members:
Henderson begins to train Charlie. Charlie’s not good at shooting targets. He’s also not good at confrontation and assertiveness.
Charlie’s lack of aggressiveness frustrates Henderson. He thinks Charlie won’t be able to tackle the bad guys.
Little does Henderson know, Charlie has other skills. Charlie goes on to take out all four of the terrorists despite what Henderson tried to teach him.
You may get frustrated with your team because they don’t have the same skill set as you. You may see that as weakness, unwillingness to learn, or another character flaw.
It’s not.
What it is is that they have a different skill set than you do. They have various ways of achieving the same goals.
You may not see it because you’ve practiced your skills for so long that you’ve mastered them. They haven’t mastered your skillset. They’ve mastered theirs. Let them use the skill sets that they know.
8. Henderson:
You surprised me.
Henderson was sent to take out Charlie after Charlie decided to leave the United States to track down the terrorists. Henderson chased him through local establishments until Charlie was cornered. Charlie used his skills to create a bomb, which he set off in the bathroom.
Henderson wasn’t prepared for Charlie’s resourcefulness. He thought Charlie would be dead before dawn. But Charlie surprised him.
You’re going to be surprised by your team members. The ones you think are your best may turn out to be the ones tanking your organization. The ones you see as lazy, undedicated, or aloof may be the ones that get the job done.
Don’t assume you know how an employee will perform. They will surprise you.
9. Inquiline:
Doing all this, is it how you should fill yours (emptiness).
Inquiline talks to Charlie about how she lost her husband. He had been a secret agent and was murdered by Russia.
The death left a hole, an emptiness, in Inquiline’s life. She found a way to fill it.
Inquiline sees the same emptiness in Charlie. She sees what he’s doing and asks him if this revenge rampage is how he should fill his hole.
We all have an emptiness or hole in our lives. It could be from abusive parents, a lack of affection, or a bad experience with another leader.
We work so hard to fill the hole so we can feel whole again. We forget to pay attention to what we’re doing.
Be aware of what holes you’re trying to fill in your life. Are you doing the right thing for the right reason? A lot of times you’ll discover you’re not.
10. Ask the right questions:
Charlie confronts Ellish and demands to know where Schiller is. Ellish tells Charlie he doesn’t know. He only knows Schiller stays on a boat in Russian waters.
Then Charlie asks a follow-up question. Maybe even a better question. He asks Ellish where he delivers the weapons Schiller orders.
Ellish’s answer gets him close enough to find Schiller.
We often ask the wrong questions when confronting others. Maybe it’s not even confronting someone else but needing to get the right answers.
We ask questions they don’t know the answer to. We avoid the questions that they do.
Begin asking a multitude of questions. Narrow your questions down to what you know the person has the answer for.
You’ll be amazed at what you can learn when you ask the right questions to the right people.
