Michael Clayton
Books and Publications Average Rating:

Rating: - Dull with a dash of boring
2.5 stars. I gave up on this movie the first time, but then a friend told me that I needed to stay with it because it got better. She lied. I didn't find anything about this movie either thrilling or suspenseful. The ending was a little too pact and yet again in a George Clooney movie ( ex. Syriana) I never come to care about the characters. Well, maybe poor Arthur. Clooney does turn in an average performance, but the movie is dull regardless.

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Rating: - brilliantly dense and subtle
The film is deliciously dense. It's so clearly a film written to be a film; it treasures the visual medium. Dialogue is often minimal, and the viewer is forced to pay attention. The story is told in the details, and I thought I was missing things at first. It's subtle and seems subdued until the last ten minutes, when all the details and images come together seamlessly. It's a film that gets better the more you think about it; one further realizes how intentional every frame is.

I've enjoyed many of Tony Gilroy's films, but I may have to actually watch The Cutting Edge now. I'm quite curious about the one film that doesn't fit with the rest of his resume.

Overall, I think it was better than No Country for Old Men, which won the Best Picture Oscar. They're certainly both great movies, but at the end of the day, Michael Clayton felt more complete. I'm incredibly partial to movies written to be movies rather than those adapted from books. They're different means of storytelling, and they're not always as compatible as producers seems to think.

George Clooney was good. Tilda Swinton was good. Tom Wilkinson was amazing. Sydney Pollock was great.

Rent it when you're in the mood for an intellectual thriller. Buy it when you realize it hasn't left your head for days. Watch repeatedly.

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Rating: - The less you know, the better
The less you know about civil litigation, the better you'll like Michael Clayton. The film is generally well-acted, though you may wonder why the rather hammy Tom Wilkinson drops into an Irish brogue in his big dramatic scene. George Clooney proves that he can carry a movie; having seen him only in the Ocean's series, I'd thought he was George Hamilton without the tan. Sydney Pollack is quite believable as the managing partner.

The tricky and very arty opening adds little to the film except unnecessary confusion. If you wonder why Clooney goes over toward the horses, that's the director's homage to a much better film, The Asphalt Jungle, which is as taut and believable as this film isn't.

As for the legal background, writer-director James Gilroy didn't even begin to do his homework. Wilkinson's contacts with the plaintiff are as unethical as the evil corporation's withholding of the key document. By the way, the plaintiff would have requested all reports made about the product (duh!), and all Wilkinson had to do was send a copy to opposing counsel, as he would ethically be required to do. Furthermore, when a lawyer begins to have a breakdown during a big case, the firm would bring in a more senior and more experienced partner. Bring in someone who didn't make partner? Only in Hollywood.

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Rating: - A film with the right parts, but ends up being too staged
The film does have a strong feel and Clooney gives a solid performance. I found Pollack's lawyer especially sharply drawn and convincing. In the end, the movie becomes another rehashing of The Insider. The screenwriter tried to create the typical conflicted sub-plot of the protagonist's battle with his professional/moral obligations and his personal struggles, etc, however this was not highly nuanced. Of course their was the divorced dad angle too for more contrived emotional push. The one liners that are stirring in the trailers turn out be banal in the context of the plot, which turns into a simple-minded rampage of a corporation hell-bent on eliminating all whistle-blowers. As for the attorney who "sees the light", although strongly performed by Wilkinson, his self-revelation becomes cliched scene-by-scene.