[maltaille]

I'll be the dissenting voice (of reason!) then: I liked it, it kept me engaged start to finish, appreciated the film-making a lot, but it didn't blow me away. Not much of a dissent, I know, but there you go.

*****Spoilers*****


I avoided this thread until I could see the movie, but several people have said it was great, so perhaps this was just the weight of expectations. Still, lots of little points kept me from sinking into the movie throughout the film. I got a sense that lots of stuff was left on the cutting room floor. Why the work on the relationship with the guy collecting the money he owed for the restaurant (both the photo in the early scene, and the comment about "just doing his job" in the late scene)? Why is it suddenly fine that people know Michael Clayton was killed, after all the effort to make Eden's death seem like suicide or an accident? For that matter, why the hell did Clayton stop there in the first place? Was that supposed to be a moment of epiphany? Sorry, not that convincing.

That said, Tilda Swinton was fantastic. Easily the best supporting role I've seen lately. Especially like the way they made her character sympathetic (such as the speech practice scenes, and shooting her in positions that emphasised her thickening waist and the way her bra cut into her back). The penultimate scene, where she's almost stuttering she's so overwhelmed, was incredible. It wasn't so much the banality of evil, for me, more that she was a frail person (remember the interview she gave early on, where she talked about feeling overwhelmed by the job when she first took it?), desperate to succeed, but without quite having the smarts or willpower necessary. Made her completely credible, in my eyes.

Also liked that Clooney spent the entire movie looking tired until the last scene, when he's suddenly clean-shaven and without the eye makeup again: it was clear it wasn't the late nights that were tiring him out, but the burden of guilt. Kind of gave away the reverse in that scene, but I'm a sucker for even moderately subtle visual indications of moral choices, so I'm willing to forgive. Thought he did a good job, but I have to judge him beside Tilda Swinton, and in that light it was only good, not great.

Have to diverge from the consensus on Tom Wilkinson as well - thought he did a fine job, especially the alley scene and the prison scene, but he also paled beside Swinton.

Music was good too, lots of cello, which usually works for me. Cinematography was appropriate, never flashy and mostly aiding the grey tone.

I think the problem was that every scene that didn't include Swinton left me thinking "yup, got that, on to the next scene now."

So, I liked it, it was ok, but I suspect I would have preferred it as a book.