Cleanskin is a 2012 British spy thriller film written and directed by Hadi Hajaig and starring Sean Bean, Abhin Galeya, Charlotte Rampling, James Fox, Tuppence Middleton, Shivani Ghai and Michelle Ryan.
Ewan, a British Secret Service operative, finds himself tasked with tracking down and neutralizing Ash, a British-born Asian suicide bomber, along with his terrorist network. Meanwhile, Ash grapples with his moral compass, contemplating his path towards extremism.
Tropes:
- Car Cushion: When Mark chases after Ash's co-bomber at the housing estate, the man attempts to escape by leaping of the balcony. Mark shoots and kills him while he is in the air and his body lands on top of car parked below.
- Double-Meaning Title: "Cleanskin" is a term for both an undercover operative unknown to his or her targets, like Ewan, and an extremist with no previous convictions, so therefore unknown to national security's services, like Ash.
- Eye Scream: When Yussif attacks Conlan in the stables, Conlan manages to get the knife off him and stabs him through the eye.
- False Flag Operation: In the epilogue, Ewan finds a safe deposit box key in the jacket of the man he killed earlier. He discovers a folder and video camera. He watches the tape, which identifies the man as Hussein Malik, an undercover SIS agent. Ewan, after seeing the file and recording, deduces that Charlotte engineered Malik's death, Ewan's assassination attempt, and framed Scott for being corrupt to cover her tracks.
- Impaled Palm: When Paul knocks Ewan's gun from his hand and tries to escape, Ewan throws himself against the door—pinning Paul between the door and the jamb—and nails his hand to the wall with a knife.
- It Works Better with Bullets: During the ambush in the hotel, Harry draws his gun and aims it at his attacker, only to discover it has been unloaded when he pulls the trigger. His attacker shoots him dead and steals his briefcase.
- Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique: While interrogating Rena to find out who paid her to unload Harry's gun, Ewan dislocates her arm, kicks her to the floor and then holds a knife to her eye and threatens to cut up her face so badly that no one will even want to look at her, let alone pay to have sex with her.
- Kitchen Chase: At the hotel, Ewan spots Ash and chases him into the hotel kitchen where they get into a brutal fight.
- Leave No Witnesses: When they go to murder Conlan, Amin tells Ash that they can leave no witnesses. While chasing Coglin through the house, he comes up Conlan's sister, but lets her go because she has her infant son with her. However, Amin returns to the house and kills not only the sister, but the child as well.
- Man on Fire: Ewan and Mark are sent to an abandoned building they are told is the home of a terrorist. Ewan confronts the man they find there and interrogates him. The man begs for mercy, but Ewan burns him to death.
- Mr. Smith: After learning there is an SIS team hunting them, Charlotte books Mark and Ewan into a hotel under the names Michael and John Smith.
- Murder by Mistake: After tracking the mobile phone to the squat, Ewan finds a Pakistani man inside and burns him to death. It is later discovered that he was not a member of the terror cell, but was someone who had stolen the phone.
- Never Suicide: In the epilogue, Ewan confronts Charlotte with the lighter at her countryside mansion and kills her, framing her death as a suicide.
- One-Word Title
- Rescue Equipment Attack: During the Kitchen Chase, Ash wallops Ewan in the head with a fire extinguisher.
- Reusable Lighter Toss: After soaking the man he find in the squat in petrol, Ewan turns him into a Man on Fire by tossing his Zippo on to him.
- Room Disservice: Disguising himself as a waiter, suicide bomber Ash makes his way to the reception's head table.
- Signature Item Clue: Ewan finds a safe deposit box key in the jacket of the man he killed earlier. He discovers a folder and video camera. He watches the tape, which identifies the man as Hussein Malik, an undercover SIS agent. One of the items in the folder is Charlotte's cigarette lighter—which has "STOP SMOKING" engraved on it—and realises that Charlotte must have left it behind during her last briefing with Malik.This proves that Charlotte is the one behind the False Flag Operation suicide bombings.
- Start of Darkness: A series of flashbacks reveal Ash's recruitment into the terrorist organization. Six years ago, Ash and Kate were dating while attending law school. At the school, Nabil, a Muslim extremist, befriends Ash and asks him to join the pro-Muslim student group he heads. Ash and his friend Yussif join the group and are exposed to Nabil's anti-Western teachings. Kate's infidelity with Nick alienates Ash, prompting him to beat him up and break up with Kate. Ash devotes himself to Nabil's cause, and helps capture and murder a former soldier, Greg Conlan, with Yussif and Conlan's family dying in the process.
- Suicide Attack: Ash sews the stolen Semtex into a jacket with an explosive belt. He gives the jacket to Adel, who detonates it at a popular London restaurant. Being the only person who knows about the stolen explosives, Ewan is tasked by his two SIS superiors Charlotte and Scott to find and eliminate the terrorists who created the bomb.
- Tae Kwon Door: When Paul knocks Ewan's gun from his hand and tries to escape, Ewan throws himself against the door—pinning Paul between the door and the jamb—and nails his hand to the wall with a knife.
- Title Drop: During the press conference following the hotel bombing, the spokesman describes Ash as a 'cleanskin': a homegrown extremist with no previous convictions, so therefore unknown to the security services.
- Video Will: Ash makes a video explaining his reasons justifying his planned Suicide Attack.
- Would Hurt a Child: Amin, the assassin Nabil sends with Ash and Yussif to murder Conlan, not only murders Conlan's sister as part of his Leave No Witnesses M.O., but also murders her infant son.
