J. Edgar ***

"J. Edgar" is an intimate look at the life of the man who created and embodied the FBI, from directing its predecessor in the '20's until his death in 1972, still at the helm, and still devoted to his long time associate and friend, Clyde Tolson. This collector of secrets had secrets of his own, and, according to this portrait, illusions and delusions that aggrandized himself and his beloved FBI. Hoover's great accomplishments - a central fingerprint repository, the application of science to crime investigation, defeats of organized crime - are footnotes to the story.

The movie is not easy to keep up with, shifting in time backwards and forwards to illustrate themes so easily that it appears unmoored at times. But there is a structure, and much of what the older Hoover dictates to a succession of compilers of his autobiography turns out to be as untethered as the film seems. Leonardo DiCaprio captures the character of the man convincingly in all his ages, from the energetic and ambitious young agent to the combative old protector of his kingdom, ready to go toe to toe with whoever might occupy the White House.

The one constant of his life was his friend, confidant, co-worker, constant lunch, dinner, and traveling companion, Clyde Tolson, sweetly played by Armie Hammer. Director Clint Eastwood has chosen to portray Tolson as utterly smitten with Hoover, a love that J. Edgar was too inhibited by his rigid upbringing by his domineering mother (an icy Judi Dench), to reciprocate fully. A complex portrait of Hoover emerges: a child of his times, a driven visionary and innovator, sometimes trampling the Constitution he was sworn to protect in the pursuit of real and imagined enemies, sometimes spying for his own salacious reasons or for blackmail to protect himself and his institution. It's not a simple story and it's hard to give it a simple score, but it's a very good movie.