Audiences tend to love movies that portray some vast bureaucratic entity as conniving and evil. Perhaps it’s a way to foist off personal responsibility as a mass-marketed fault. In The International, the bad guys are Luxembourg bankers who deal in lots more than cash -- specifically, in sales of illegal arms. Their bank is evil and very powerful, and those who get too close to understanding what it really does tend to end up dead, in a variety of accidents or assassinations.

Clive Owen plays Louis Salinger, an Interpol agent who scents the corruption and sets out to do in the bank without getting himself killed. Owen is strong and assured, and does a reasonable number of physical stunts, but he’s also just vulnerable enough that it doesn’t always seem a sure thing that Salinger will be able to pull it off. It’s one of the devices that keep us alert and scared, from a little to a lot, throughout the film’s 118 minutes.

The plot gets rolling as Salinger investigates the mysterious demise of another agent, who dies while sauntering across the highway to give his report. It then bogs down a bit to introduce various characters, mostly notably Eleanor Whitman (Naomi Watts), an American agent who’s come over to assist Salinger. There’s a lot of talk and little action, and a barely-hinted-at romance between Louis and Eleanor.

But once The International gets rolling, it really rocks. The budget must have been huge for this truly global project. Though filmed in many locations around the world, its most memorable shoot-out takes place in New York, at the Guggenheim Museum. With its system of mirrors and vaulted central staircase, the place looks so ideal for a great shoot-’em-up that you wonder why no one ever thought of it before. There’s a lot of shooting, more breaking glass than I would have thought possible, and a lot of spilled blood. This scene of confrontation is so intense that it will leave you breathless, and I predict that it will become a classic.

There are other good chases and action sequences here, and of one of the reasons they work so well has to do with director Tom Tykwer, perhaps best known for his film Run Lola Run. Tykwer’s pacing of action sequences is dead on, and his choice of camera angles just unusual enough to be edgy. Yet you can follow the action without a moment’s confusion, unlike with so many current films that seem to use quick cutting indiscriminately to excite the viewer, and often leave me in the dark, more frustrated than thrilled. (The most recent James Bond film, Quantum of Solace, is a case in point.) Now there’s a thought: Hire Tykwer to direct the next 007 movie. Hope someone with casting power is reading.

Though its dialogue is not bad, The International will be remembered for its action scenes, which are imaginatively directed with a sure hand, immaculately shot, and accompanied by pulse-pounding music (by Reinhold Heil, Johnny Klimek, and Tykwer himself) designed to get the blood boiling. Those deliver, and it’s well worth putting up with a few static minutes to get to them. Besides, every once in a while, you really do need to catch your breath.

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