That’s what happens in Child 44, the new political thriller based on the first in a trilogy of novels by Tom Rob Smith. Tom Hardy stars as MGB agent Leo Demidov, who is busy at his job of routing out political dissidents when two major challenges come into his life: he is asked to denounce his own wife, Raisa (Noomi Rapace), as a traitor, and also stumbles upon a series of grisly child killings that seem to stretch across 20 years and several areas of the Soviet Union. However, whilst the novel was praised by critics as a dense, intricate and suspenseful read, the film is overplotted and often confusing. Too many subplots work their way in and out of the main narrative, but the story’s biggest flaw – juggling the two major storylines of Demidov’s conflict with the state over his wife and his investigation of child murders – is a problem that screenwriter Richard Price (Clockers) can’t solve. The two are connected only by the slimmest of thematic threads and narratively by a number of too-large coincidences. We’re left feeling like there is some link that we’re missing, and the film’s constant switching between plots never allows any real momentum or suspense to take hold. The mostly strong cast do what they can, but are also forced to struggle with the minutiae of the story as well as the thick, sometimes impenetrable Russian accents that everyone bravely adopts. Hardy occasionally falls back into brutish Bane mode, but for the most part succeeds at capturing Demidov as a tormented man of conscience trying to navigate a system that has little place for such. There is also a clear emotional undercurrent between him and Noomi Rapace, although her motivations are just murky enough to feel like they’re left to be explored further in one of the latter novels. Gary Oldman, meanwhile, seems as though he could have been written out with one more streamlined draft of the script. Child killings, political treachery, paranoia fear and social standing in a totalitarian state – none of it adds up to much here, although there could probably be a more potent story chiseled out of all those elements. Even the identity of the killer doesn’t provide for any particularly revelatory moments or insights. Only the epilogue delivers a moment of grace that nearly pulls at least some of the movie together. Like the railroad trains that the characters are constantly boarding and exiting, Child 44 is full of smoke and clanking machinery – only this one is carrying little of value inside.  Follow our Twitter feed for faster news and bad jokes right here. And be our Facebook chum here.