The Secret Agent: one of my favorite genre of movies: should be boring but never is

I’m still a struggling a bit with pulling it all together, but it’s something to do with how things that appear as one have a duality: north/south Brazil, the cat’s face, real/fake names, two jobs (dentist/teacher, agent/researcher), half up front/half after, pre/post-google, same actor playing father/son. The list goes on.