Michael Clayton
De he say to pick up seventeen baguettes or seven teen brunettes?
An amoral fixer for a big-time law firm (George Clooney) swings into action when a colleague (Tom Wilkinson) has a nervous breakdown that jeopardizes a billion-dollar lawsuit in which the firm is defending an agribusiness conglomerate; meanwhile, the conglomerate’s chief counsel (Tilda Swinton) takes ruthless steps of her own. Director Tony Gilroy’s script is literate but murky, his pacing sluggish. Performances are excellent (including Sydney Pollack and Michael O’Keefe as Clooney’s higher-ups), but Gilroy’s awkward flashback structure makes the narrative unnecessarily complicated, and the tone of lofty menace grows tiresome. Still, a good last scene can redeem a lot of tedium, and Gilroy provides a doozy, immensely satisfying while giving Clooney and Swinton one of the best scenes of both their careers.
