Michael Clayton

I've never been a fan of titles that are simply someone's name. It seems to me a real lack of creativity. That is the last criticism you will hear from me of Michael Clayton, which is easily the best film I've seen yet this year. Written and directed by Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton is a taut and insightful look at a man who is at frayed ends who struggles to redeem himself. This is an old subject for a film, but this film is so well written, acted and shot that it makes the whole thing seem fresh.

George Clooney plays the title character, a lawyer who is forty-five years old, but has not made partner. Instead he is utilized to clean up other people's messes. "I'm a janitor," we hear him say with disgust. He is also broke, after going in with his dissolute brother on a bar that has gone belly up. Even after sellng all of the assets he still owes $75,000 to some folks who aren't exactly lenient about late fees. "Find a treasure map and start digging," he's told.

So Clooney isn't exactly in the best of moods when he has to rush off to Milwaukee. The senior litigating partner, played by Tom Wilkinson, has had a breakdown at a deposition and chased a plaintiff through a parking lot wearing nothing but his socks. If this isn't enough of a problem, the case Wilkinson was working on is a three billion dollar class action suit against an agricultural conglomerate for manufacturing a weed killer that also gives people cancer. The company's general counsel, Tilda Swinton, is understandably disturbed and wants some answers. Clooney thinks it's simply a matter of Wilkinson, a manic depressive, going off his meds, but after a while we learn that there is something more sinister afoot.

The plot of the film, which involves a hushed-up document that proves the company's guilt, is really a kind of Hitchcockian McGuffin, and isn't exactly a classic mystery. What's really going on here is the salvation of a human being. Clooney is excellent in showing us a man with many layers. He comes from a family of cops, and worked as a district attorney, but now is a shadowy figure in a white-shoe law firm. Just what happened? He's divorced but has a good relationship with his son, and more problematic relationships with his brothers, one a cop and the other, as mentioned, a recovering drug addict who led him down the primrose path with a failed business opportunity. The firm's senior partner, played by Sidney Pollack, clearly values Clooney's ability to put out fires, but not enough to make him partner. There's a lot more going on underneath the surface.

Gilroy, who is best known as the screenwriter of the Bourne films, knocks one of out of the park in his directorial debut. The film is lit mostly in blues and grays, with nary a ray of sunlight peeking through. Clooney is always in his uniform of a dark suit and tie, ready at a moment's notice to do the firm's bidding. Gilroy even gets a chance to flex his Bourne muscles with a cat and mouse car chase toward the end of the film, which is exceedingly well done.

Clooney, Wilkinson and Swinton are all terrific, and should all be in the hunt come Oscar time. Swinton, in a role that could have been a standard villain, is given extra depth with scenes showing how terribly insecure she is, and how deeply over her head she gets. Wilkinson is particularly scintillating as a man who finds clarity in his madness. He gives a classic line reading when Clooney tells him that he's the senior partner of a top law firm. "I am Shiva, the god of death," Wilkinson replies, in all seriousness.