Michael Clayton.
Directed and written by Tony Gilroy.
The legal thriller is a firmly established accepted genre in the
movies. We have also had our share of corporate thrillers. “Michael
Clayton” combines the two and is very good for what it does. This is
the best anti-big film that has come along in years, a
corporate-legal-crime thriller of the highest order. If you don’t
trust lawyers, this is the film for you. If you believe, as many do,
that all lawyers are corrupt, deceitful and only after big bucks,
you will applaud this film. If you further believe, as many do, that
our big corporations are corrupt, deceitful and only after even
bigger bucks than what lawyers get, this is also your film. If you
believe that corporate greed is rampant in America, this is your
film. Lawyers and corporations are easy targets, as well they should
be. Their often-arrogant public relations do not help their image.
Throw in George Clooney (Michael Clayton) – one of the film’s
producers as well as its star -- at his handsome, weary, slouching,
seedy best, playing a lawyer who practices no law but fixes
difficult problems for a major firm. Add a fine, sharp featured
Tilda
Swinton (Karen Crowder) at her vulnerable, do-it-for-the-corporation
at any cost, a mass of nerves with no conscience. She is a corporate
lawyer who will do anything to keep her position to aid and comfort
her company, and ultimately herself, including spying and then
murder. Motivated by power, she wants to be the perfect woman but
fails miserably because she can’t control her ambition. Ask yourself
when you last saw a woman sweat as she does in this film and you
have a strong sense of its realism. Then we have Tom Wilkenson who
plays Arthur Eden, a renegade lawyer with a conscience who blows the
whistle on a major corporation that produces a product that kills
people. With all this, we have arrived in agitprop country so strong
it grabs one by the seat of the pants and never lets go. The film
moves quickly. Its pace is taut. The hidden backroom where Michael
Clayton gambles illegally defines him. A loan shark looking to get
money laid out for a failed restaurant pushes him so quietly that
you know if he tries, he can make Clayton’s life miserable.
Clayton’s busted marriage and his relationships with his brothers,
and, more importantly with his young son also define him. The murder
of his friend Arthur Eden, the lawyer who is trying to blow the
whistle on the big corporation and the bombing of Michael Clayton’s
car, finally move him to action. My only problem is that the movie
ends too swiftly, almost as an afterthought. I got the feeling that
the director cut the film for time. The ending was not a surprise.
It worked well, but as a member of the audience, I could have had a
bit more exposition. Then again, had I had that, the ending might
not have been so sweet. Anyway, it is a fine movie. Go see it.
Juno. Directed by Jason Reitman. This is
2007’s little film that could. We all know the story by now.
Sixteen-year-old girl becomes pregnant after one episode of sex.
Isn’t it always that way in real life? The lead actress, Ellen Page,
as Juno the pregnant teenager, is wonderful. After her one night of
love, and knowing she is pregnant, she decides to keep the baby at
any cost. She has a plan. Juno, a girl who is more articulate than
any other teenager alive, decides to give her baby to a family she
believes will give the child the best home possible. That family has
flaws. The husband wants out of his marriage and even makes a play
for Juno. The wife, unable to conceive with her husband, needs a
baby to complete her as a person. Juno’s family, though quirky, and
oddly forgiving, is far better adjusted than the couple she decides
will be good for her child. Juno’s family comes to the conclusion
that she knows her own mind and gives her unrelenting support. The
script by Diablo Cody is not only funny and filled with
understanding. It is remarkable for its compilation of every teenage
expression imaginable, and then some. It is hard to believe any
teenager, no matter how bright and sardonic, has the power of teen
speak as well as does Juno. We watch Juno wrestle with her
predicament with a fierce determination to run her life as she sees
fit. The direction by Jason Reitman is on target. The film has
become something of a societal benchmark with all sorts of meaning
read into why teenage pregnancies and teenage abortions are down. I
cannot vouch for the reliability of those positions, but “Juno” is
still a movie, and a good one at that. So for those who have not
seen it, see it now and enjoy it for what it is, well played, well
written and a well-directed film. ................................................................................................................................................................. The Savages. Written and directed by Tamara Jenkins
is, on the surface, a simple story about a brother and sister, both
adults, who barely get along. Their sibling rivalry is often so
nasty as to make one’s hair stand on end. The sister is an aspiring
playwright involved in a dispiriting sexual relationship with a
sleazy neighbor from upstairs, who walks his dog as an excuse to
have sex with her. The brother is a college professor who leads a
sloppy, uncommitted, life with an unfinished book and a fear of
committing to the woman he loves. Their father has Alzheimer’s
disease and must be properly cared for as he quickly slides toward
the end of his life. This film has an excellent script about a
difficult subject that affects some of us now and will affect more
of us in the future. The film has remarkable performances especially
from Laura Linney, and the usual good ones from Philip Seymour
Hoffman and Philip Bosco. The direction by Ms. Jenkins, as with a
good short story, makes its points with little or no fuss. Watching
“The Savages” is not easy viewing. The siblings are self-absorbed
and not very successful. We see the father slipping quickly and at
times not quietly into Alzheimer’s. As his life is ending, with his
memory fading, he does not know, or seem to care, what will come
next. Apparently not a very good father to his children when they
were growing up, his loss of memory at the end does not allow him or
either of his children to come to grips with what life was really
like in his household. The film’s one fault is that the ending
becomes a bit too Hollywood, as all the loose ends – the father’s
death, the sister’s play in production and the brother off to a
conference in Europe where he will see his girlfriend – become
neatly tied together. But I did not mind that. I thought the brother
and sister needed a break, so why not. Though the story came
together at the end, there was still no final success, only the
start of what might be the flowering of two lives. .................................................................................................................................................................
At NBC News for 35 years, Ron Steinman was bureau chief
in Saigon, Hong Kong and London, was a senior producer on Today and wrote
and produced for Sunday Today. At ABC News Productions, he produced
and wrote documentaries for A&E, TLC, Discovery, Lifetime and the
History Channel. He has a Peabody, a National Headliner award, a
National Press Club award, a International Documentary Festival Gold
Camera Award, two American Women in Radio & Television awards and
has been nominated for five Emmy's. He is a partner in
Douglas/Steinman Productions, whose latest documentary, "Luboml: My
Heart Remembers," aired on PBS' WLIW/21 and the History Channel in
Israel, April 29, 2003. He is the author of, "The Soldiers 'Story",
"Women in Vietnam," and most recently, "Inside Television's First
War: A Saigon Journal," University of Missouri Press, 2002.
Tilda
Swinton (Karen Crowder) at her vulnerable, do-it-for-the-corporation
at any cost, a mass of nerves with no conscience. She is a corporate
lawyer who will do anything to keep her position to aid and comfort
her company, and ultimately herself, including spying and then
murder. Motivated by power, she wants to be the perfect woman but
fails miserably because she can’t control her ambition. Ask yourself
when you last saw a woman sweat as she does in this film and you
have a strong sense of its realism. Then we have Tom Wilkenson who
plays Arthur Eden, a renegade lawyer with a conscience who blows the
whistle on a major corporation that produces a product that kills
people. With all this, we have arrived in agitprop country so strong
it grabs one by the seat of the pants and never lets go. The film
moves quickly. Its pace is taut. The hidden backroom where Michael
Clayton gambles illegally defines him. A loan shark looking to get
money laid out for a failed restaurant pushes him so quietly that
you know if he tries, he can make Clayton’s life miserable.
Clayton’s busted marriage and his relationships with his brothers,
and, more importantly with his young son also define him. The murder
of his friend Arthur Eden, the lawyer who is trying to blow the
whistle on the big corporation and the bombing of Michael Clayton’s
car, finally move him to action. My only problem is that the movie
ends too swiftly, almost as an afterthought. I got the feeling that
the director cut the film for time. The ending was not a surprise.
It worked well, but as a member of the audience, I could have had a
bit more exposition. Then again, had I had that, the ending might
not have been so sweet. Anyway, it is a fine movie. Go see it.
Juno. Directed by Jason Reitman. This is
2007’s little film that could. We all know the story by now.
Sixteen-year-old girl becomes pregnant after one episode of sex.
Isn’t it always that way in real life? The lead actress, Ellen Page,
as Juno the pregnant teenager, is wonderful. After her one night of
love, and knowing she is pregnant, she decides to keep the baby at
any cost. She has a plan. Juno, a girl who is more articulate than
any other teenager alive, decides to give her baby to a family she
believes will give the child the best home possible. That family has
flaws. The husband wants out of his marriage and even makes a play
for Juno. The wife, unable to conceive with her husband, needs a
baby to complete her as a person. Juno’s family, though quirky, and
oddly forgiving, is far better adjusted than the couple she decides
will be good for her child. Juno’s family comes to the conclusion
that she knows her own mind and gives her unrelenting support. The
script by Diablo Cody is not only funny and filled with
understanding. It is remarkable for its compilation of every teenage
expression imaginable, and then some. It is hard to believe any
teenager, no matter how bright and sardonic, has the power of teen
speak as well as does Juno. We watch Juno wrestle with her
predicament with a fierce determination to run her life as she sees
fit. The direction by Jason Reitman is on target. The film has
become something of a societal benchmark with all sorts of meaning
read into why teenage pregnancies and teenage abortions are down. I
cannot vouch for the reliability of those positions, but “Juno” is
still a movie, and a good one at that. So for those who have not
seen it, see it now and enjoy it for what it is, well played, well
written and a well-directed film. 
The Savages. Written and directed by Tamara Jenkins
is, on the surface, a simple story about a brother and sister, both
adults, who barely get along. Their sibling rivalry is often so
nasty as to make one’s hair stand on end. The sister is an aspiring
playwright involved in a dispiriting sexual relationship with a
sleazy neighbor from upstairs, who walks his dog as an excuse to
have sex with her. The brother is a college professor who leads a
sloppy, uncommitted, life with an unfinished book and a fear of
committing to the woman he loves. Their father has Alzheimer’s
disease and must be properly cared for as he quickly slides toward
the end of his life. This film has an excellent script about a
difficult subject that affects some of us now and will affect more
of us in the future. The film has remarkable performances especially
from Laura Linney, and the usual good ones from Philip Seymour
Hoffman and Philip Bosco. The direction by Ms. Jenkins, as with a
good short story, makes its points with little or no fuss. Watching
“The Savages” is not easy viewing. The siblings are self-absorbed
and not very successful. We see the father slipping quickly and at
times not quietly into Alzheimer’s. As his life is ending, with his
memory fading, he does not know, or seem to care, what will come
next. Apparently not a very good father to his children when they
were growing up, his loss of memory at the end does not allow him or
either of his children to come to grips with what life was really
like in his household. The film’s one fault is that the ending
becomes a bit too Hollywood, as all the loose ends – the father’s
death, the sister’s play in production and the brother off to a
conference in Europe where he will see his girlfriend – become
neatly tied together. But I did not mind that. I thought the brother
and sister needed a break, so why not. Though the story came
together at the end, there was still no final success, only the
start of what might be the flowering of two lives.