‘The Commissioner’ Conspires but Doesn’t Manage to Intrigue

When his investigation into a chemical weapons cover-up takes a menacing turn, John Hurt’s character in “The Commissioner” observes: “It’s all a bit James Bond, isn’t it?”

The problem with this Movie Channel presentation, however, is that it isn’t a bit James Bond. Even an apartment bombing and a massive toxic spill fail to energize this snooze-fest, which debuts tonight on the premium cable channel.

“The Commissioner” combines a number of hot-button issues--including nervousness about the manufacture of chemical weapons and unease over the growing power of the European Union--into a vast conspiracy theory in which collusion between world governments and big business puts the whole planet at risk.

Unfortunately, Hurt--so watchable in such movies as “The Elephant Man” and the more recent “Love and Death on Long Island”--is unbearably stiff in this role as a scandal-plagued British politician who is banished to a post on the European Commission in Brussels. George Sluizer’s direction fails to generate any urgency in the turgid screenplay that he wrote with Christina Kallas, based on Stanley Johnson’s novel.

* “The Commissioner” debuts tonight at 9 on the Movie Channel. The network has rated it TV-14 (may be inappropriate for children younger than 14).