Michael Clayton (2007)
Directed by Tony Gilroy
A law firm brings in its "fixer" to remedy the situation after a lawyer has a breakdown while representing a chemical company that he knows is guilty in a multi-billion dollar class action suit.
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Meanwhile Arthur is carrying on like Peter Finch's Howard Beale in "Network," and Michael is sinking inexorably into the sloughs of despondency.
As Arthur Edens, a law partner whose work on a huge class action suit threatens to unravel the case, the great Tom Wilkinson delivers spoken arias with soaring, manic conviction worthy of Peter Finch in "Network."
I guess you could describe it as a Manhattan "legal thriller" -- most of the main characters are corporate lawyers -- that strikes a delicate tonal balance between the cynical political paranoia of the "Bourne" movies, the satirical paranoia of "Network," the corporate paranoia of "The Insider," and the legalistic paranoia of "Erin Brockovich."
Michael Clayton is not unlike the great Paddy Chayefsky-penned films The Hospital and Network, as it’s absurd when you sit back and think about the plot, yet it works – making for a film that’s more accurate and real than most thrillers.
"Michael Clayton" - Tony Gilroy's solid if not quite thrilling legal drama - aims to do for law firms what "Network" did for TV stations.
Suddenly conscious of his role as corporate asshole, he bares soul and body in court and becomes Peter Finch in Network, only minus the satire; the situation points Clayton toward his own epiphany, while the company's nervously nefarious chief counsel (Tilda Swinton) takes the cleaning into her own hands with a pair of hired killers.
In the tradition of such classics as "All the President's Men," "Klute" and "Three Days of the Condor," it's a film that dares not to patronize or pander to its audience, but rather to assume viewers possess the intelligence to connect its twisty trail of dots.
But he otherwise gives the movie a frantic energy, a breathless pace, a dense atmosphere of corruption, plenty of snappy dialogue, and an ensemble of morally compromised supporting characters wonderfully played by Wilkinson, Tilda Swinton and Sydney Pollack (director of the iconic '70s paranoid thriller, "Three Days of the Condor.")
It's something of John Grisham meets "Three Days of the Condor," although, as the director points out in his commentary, the movie never goes near a courtroom.
In the tradition of such classics as "All the President's Men," "Klute" and "Three Days of the Condor," it's a film that dares not to patronize or pander to its audience, but rather to assume viewers possess the intelligence to connect its twisty trail of dots.
In fact, its proper place would seem to be with the paranoia thrillers of the 1970s, a sweaty sub-genre that houses such classics as All the President's Men, The Parallax View and Three Days of the Condor.
It’s a character study in the tradition of, say, “Harry and Tonto” or “A Woman Under the Influence,” but it also wants to be a paranoid thriller along the lines of “The Parallax View” or “Three Days of the Condor.”
These movies stand as on par with Redford’s The Candidate, Three Days Of The Condor and All The President’s Men in their absolute belief that something is rotten in the state of the union.
Like the Paul Newman figure in The Verdict, Michael is working-class and has both lust and contempt for the legal establishment that will hire him as the help but not invite him to sit at the table.
Gilroy's crafty original script is a legal thriller in the vein of Sidney Lumet's "The Verdict" and Sydney Pollack's "Absence of Malice."
Like the movie it’s most akin to – Sidney Lumet’s masterful The Verdict – there’s a strange subjective synchronicity that occurs.
The bones of the story are recognizable from courtroom dramas like The Verdict or … And Justice for All: A burned-out attorney finds his conscience when he uncovers a case so rotten that he can't not fight the good fight.
Tony Gilroy, screenwriter of the "Bourne" adventures, makes his writing/directing debut with a throwback to trim, intelligent moral thrillers like "The Verdict" and "Absence of Malice."
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He has alternated parts in projects like "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" "Intolerable Cruelty," and the three "Ocean's" movies with "The Perfect Storm," "Good Night, and Good Luck," "Syriana," "The Good German," and the 2007 film we're discussing here, "Michael Clayton," which may his best starring vehicle to date.
Clooney, eschewing the glib, glamorous persona of the "Ocean's" movies and other slick bonbons, is in baggy-eyed "Syriana" mode here, moving through the days-long 3 a.m. of the soul with none of the cocky affectations that he often relies on.
In that regard, Michael Clayton somewhat resembles Stephen Gaghan’s Syriana (2005), with its bleak portrait of an utterly hopeless situation, but this film never quite reaches that level.
Clooney je u ovom filmu bolji nego u nekim svojim ranijim i razvikanijim politički angažiranim filmovima ("Laku noć i sretno", "Syriana"), ali je još daleko od ostvarenja koje bi se uistinu moglo nazvati velikim.
But in “Syriana” and now in “Michael Clayton” he has done something more interesting: he’s playing clever guys who lack the killer instinct, who have some strain of personal honor that holds them back from simply winning.
Michael Clayton is a different breed of cocktease -- the "adult" stuff promised is grave analysis of personal crisis in a corrupted world, what you get is a glum remake of Absence of Malice, with Sydney Pollack himself on hand for good luck.
Gilroy's crafty original script is a legal thriller in the vein of Sidney Lumet's "The Verdict" and Sydney Pollack's "Absence of Malice."
Tony Gilroy, screenwriter of the "Bourne" adventures, makes his writing/directing debut with a throwback to trim, intelligent moral thrillers like "The Verdict" and "Absence of Malice."
In the tradition of such classics as "All the President's Men," "Klute" and "Three Days of the Condor," it's a film that dares not to patronize or pander to its audience, but rather to assume viewers possess the intelligence to connect its twisty trail of dots.
In fact, its proper place would seem to be with the paranoia thrillers of the 1970s, a sweaty sub-genre that houses such classics as All the President's Men, The Parallax View and Three Days of the Condor.
These movies stand as on par with Redford’s The Candidate, Three Days Of The Condor and All The President’s Men in their absolute belief that something is rotten in the state of the union.
The movie was written and directed by Tony Gilroy , son of the playwright Frank D. Gilroy (" The Subject Was Roses ").
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These movies stand as on par with Redford’s The Candidate, Three Days Of The Condor and All The President’s Men in their absolute belief that something is rotten in the state of the union.
Clooney’s performance recalls his work in Soderbergh’s “Out of Sight,” while the movie’s pacing reminded me of Minghella’s “The Talented Mr. Ripley.”