A Chechen Muslim illegally immigrates to Hamburg, where he gets caught in the international war on terror.

When a brutally-tortured half-Chechen, half-Russian immigrant turns up in Hamburg's Islamic community laying claim to his father's ill-gotten fortune, both German and US security agencies take a close interest: as the clock ticks down and the stakes rise, the race is on to establish this most wanted man's true identity--oppressed victim or destruction-bent extremist? Based on John le Carré's novel, A MOST WANTED MAN is a contemporary, cerebral tale of intrigue, love, rivalry, and politics that prickles with tension right through to its last heart-stopping scene.—Roadside Attractions

In the years immediately following 9/11, Gunter Bachmann (Hoffman) is a counter-terrorist expert based in Hamburg who operates as a rogue agent, independently of the Grenzschutzgruppe 9 DE Bundespolizei (GSG-9). He specializes in bringing down jihadists, and as the story opens, he begins to fixate on Chechen immigrant Issa Karpov (Grigoriy Dobrygin), newly-arrived in town. Issa's motivations are initially unknown, but he befriends an American social worker (Rachel McAdams) who grows convinced of his harmlessness and sets about persuading Gunter of the same. Meanwhile, Gunter becomes aware of a palpable and imminent threat to national security that involves future jihad activity, and devises an ingenious plan that he hopes will both extinguish the threat and provide amnesty for Issa. The Americans and the GSG-9, however, learn of Gunter's plot and express both impatience and a general skepticism about the scheme's effectiveness..