Michael Clayton

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origino

250+ Posts
I liked this movie. I see why it was nominated. Anyway, What did you guys think about this film?

I am always amazed at who gets nominated for "best supporting actor/actress". Tilda Swinton (who won this year) was not in the movie for more than 30 min. it seemed. While she was good in the parts she was in, I was surprised she won.

Clooney was good. I was telling a friend the other day that he really is one of the best actors of our time. Too high of praise? Maybe, but he can REALLY do any kind of role and doesn't seem to take himself too seriously. I don't believe he deserved the best actor award for this role, he was still really good.

Anyway, I am rambling..good movie. (And yes I just saw it for the first time last night)
 
I haven't seen the movie (probably will see it along with Syriana....) but I agree with you on Clooney. He's a great actor and seems to be a throwback to the Gregory Peck/Cary Grant days.

There's an article in a recent Time issue about George. He seems like a genuinely nice guy.
 
I haven't seen it either, but I noticed watching the Oscars that Tilda Swinton herself seemed pretty damned surprised she won
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And I wholeheartedly agree with you on Clooney -- fantastic actor.
 
I enjoyed the movie, though I don't understand how the character Micheal Clayton could accept his position in the firm for so long without better pay/partnership/etc. Maybe I'm just not hip to how those things work.

Tilda Swinton was barely even in this movie. How she gets an award (or nominated for one) for 15 minutes of work is beyond me.
 
not only was her character not in the movie much, her performance was, IMO, the weakest point of the whole movie. really, she just wasn't that good.

Clooney and wilkinson were both excellent and I liked the movie, a lot.
 
I liked it very much and thought Clooney and Wilkenson were great. Tilda Swinton was not very good at all. Her American accent is the worst of all the British actors/actresses.
 
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Why didn't he just sell his car to get the cash to pay off his loan for the bar/restaurant? That Mercedes he was driving was likely a $100K car, right? He could have downgraded and paid off the loan I would think. Of course, then he couldn't have dramatically sold out his friend when obtaining the cash from the firm...
 
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so in the end, he does the right thing, but isn't he throwing his law firm completely under the bus? are lawyers allowed to **** over their clients, or do they have a duty to represent them adequately, professionally etc, even if they think they're guilty?
 
I just saw this and thought it was really good, not as good as the other nominees (didn't see atonement) but easily top 5 of the year. I didn't understand Swinton being nominated until the very end when her performance was spot on. You could really feel her character coming apart.

Also I don't think he cared about the law firm much, he hated his job
 
He didn't sell the car because as he said in the movie it was leased to the firm.

Maybe someone like SLExpress who has what seems like total recall of movies can give a better explanation on the partnership, but I think it centered on a few points.

First, I am not sure exactly how long he had been with the firm. Long enough to have been through a prior episode with Wilkinson's character, but he wasn't there from the beginning.

Second, I am not sure if he even had his own clients or how he was bringing revenue into the firm. It seemed like he was a back-office resource the "lawyers" of the firm would turn to him to resolve special situations. His brother summed it up best when he said the cops thought he was lawyers and the lawyers thought he was a cop.

I enjoyed the movie a great deal as I favor dialouge heavy movies. Especially how things weren't wrapped up nice and neat at the end. You have room for alot of conjecture about what was going to happen next in almost every aspect of the movie.

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My only issue was how Clooney just happened to stop the car before the bomb was detonated. I know I am nitpicking, but after going all that time in the movie without hanging to some hair thin plausibility of a plot line like movies such as Crash, Babel, and Syriana I was a bit disappointed in that one moment, but over all it was a great movie.

Do agree on Tilda Swanson being the weak part of the acting. I just don't see her character having the strength to order what she did at the end.
 
spoilers....


I thought the movie was just okay, but a few things really hit home as a law student:

The fact that MC was too busy and stressed to read the book his son was reading. And that while he had a nice home, car, and suits he was essentially broke.

Also, when the other guy (litigator that went crazy) was ranting about how his life's work was defending a poisonous carcinogen. Sad and insightful.

Lawyers have an ethical responsibility to report professional misconduct in certain (many) situations. I could look up the Model Code rule, but I'm not going to.
 
That's really interesting, the posts about past oscar winners and how little actual screen time they had. I personally didn't really see anything special with Tilda Swinton's performance that required her oscar win. I now look back on it and thought she played it well, but I never thought she'd get nominated for it, much less win it. I do have to admit, for some strange reason, she kinda turned me on as the white witch in "The Chronicles of Narnia". I have no idea as to why. Witchey Woman.
 
I posted this glowing review when it first came out, long before the excellece of "No Country for Old Men" hit the screens or Daniel Day-Lewis appeared in "There Will Be Blood."

I also later thought Ruby Dee in "American Gangster" would be a strong nominee for Best Supporting Actress, but I still predicted Swinton would win the Oscar.



Saw "Michael Clayton" and my wife and I liked it a lot.

We think this movie might well win Best Picture next Spring.

No sex, little action and few thrills, just good acting, an interesting story and a cool ending.

If you enjoyed Al Pacino in “The Godfather,” WiIliam H. Macy in “The Cooler” or Harvey Keitel in “Pulp Fiction” as “problem fixers,” you might enjoy George Clooney as the troubleshooting lawyer in this movie.

That’s high praise, so go see what you think, if, after reading all of this review, it fits what you sometimes enjoy in a movie.

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Clooney has never been a favorite actor of mine, but this is a really good role and he is very good in it.

Tilda Swinton should receive a Best Supporting Actress nomination and Tom Wilkinson and Sidney Pollack were good too.

Lots of talking drives this flick, but it’s so well-made that it moves right along, IMO.

Clooney has a serious chance at Best Actor, but I think screenwriter/director Tony Gilroy’s chances for Oscars are even better.

This is really good moviemaking and Clooney did really well in what may be the role, so far, of his career.

Director/writer Tony Gilroy wrote the three screenplays for the Bourne trilogy.

I
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Don’t go requiring car chases, romance, gunplay or explosions.

If you enjoyed "Breach," as did I, this movie has somewhat the same vibe and similar dynamics, however "Michael Clayton" moves much more crispy and has a lot more excitement to offer.

This flick, while not recommendable for all types of movie watchers, is a really good one for those who savor cinematic excellence and enjoy paying attention on multiple levels.

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Fast Fred--that's a really good review. I especially like the comparison to "Breach" which i thought was an under-rated movie.

I saw Michael Clayton about a month ago and re-watched it on tuesday. I really, really liked it. It was very well done, and my only nit-pick has already been pointed out.

SPOILERS:



When he gets out of the car and the two guys set off the bomb. Sure, it seems bad, but honestly, you could argue the only reason they got a fix on his location was because he stopped the car and got out. Otherwise he was driving away from them and "strobing."

I also thought Tilda Swinton did a fine job as a general council who was new and in over her head. George Cloony's character was a fantastic choice--using the firm's fixer as the central character made me really wish this movie was another hour long and that we got to see a few more situations where Cloony laid the fixing smack down like he did during the hit-and-run convo.

I came into this movie in a rather unique situation--the company in the film, Unorth, is very clearly based on Monsanto. My dad is a lawyer for Monsanto and has been for over 20 years, so I know all about poisonous weed killer and how people view it. Leave it to hollywood to take the side of the "little guys", but what could I expect, i've heard it all before. In fact, my dad's position is Tilda Swinton's, so the whole time I'm watching her face these decisions i'm thinking "holy ****, the pressure of a 3 billion dollar lawsuit really takes its toll." Luckily, he doesn't kill people.
 
I walked away from that movie thinking Swinton had just iced the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. It's interesting how people can take such different things away from a performance. Wilkinson was also terrific.

I agree wholeheartedly that Clooney is "our" Cary Grant -- maybe not the greatest actor working, but very skilled with a good sense of humor and a reasonable dose of humility in his work.
 
Thought it was decent. Nothing special. Felt like another Grisham movie to me. Pollack was the best guy on the screen other than Wilkinson. Was somewhat dissapointed.
 
Mizzou.

I have a very good friend whose family every year goes to the Mayo clinic for a complete check for tumors due to some nasty chemicals found buried on a chemical company long ago and was forgotten at the time of sale.

Not saying it is exactly the same situation, but to think this doesn't happen is wrong.

I am not anti-business and Hollywood does have a bias, but the story is highly plausible based upon the unfortunate number of situations where corporate America has acted in their best interest instead of the public.
 
I consider myself pretty far to the right and this movie didn't bother me one bit. I didn't get the liberalized view. I saw it as a high priced attorney going batshit crazy and starts trying to prove the other side's case. That makes for a very good storyline, in my view.


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Watched last night, and thought it was great. Wilkenson nailed the burned-out litigator (being one myself, I could relate).

SPOILER:


My only issue was that Swinson's general counsel character wouldn't have ordered a hit to save the company. Burying the memo and ordering surveillance is plausible, but murder? If she had built the company from the ground up, I guess I could see it, but she inherited the position, then found out. In reality, she would've said "F that, this ain't my mess, I'm out."
 
Saw the movie last week, before the Oscars.

Comments:
1. Interesting movie, good dialogue, filmed well. Better than average movie.
2. Swinton was nothing special.
3. Clooney's son and his role added nothing.
4. Clooney's drunk brother and police officer brother (or brother-in-law) added nothing.
5. No cliffhangers here; pretty predictable.
 
anotherwebexpert-- please don't get me wrong, or think that i have blinders on. I absolutely realize that as chemicals are developed, we usually have NO IDEA what their long term effects are, and occasionally, yet tragically, sometimes old stuff is stored wrong, or gets into water supplies, and basically causes havoc. There's a reason Superfund exists.

However, the vilification of the American company is what I see in a movie like this. Unorth was clearly the "bad guy" when in reality, it's usually much more complicated than that. In my experience, chemical companies are generally responsible actors in difficult situations with older products.

Take Agent Orange for example--the government directed it to be made, and after everyone found out how badly it messes with our bodies, all of a sudden "agent orange" is a symbol for irresponsible corporations. Sure, it was bad. However, it's not like the US gov. knew that when they needed it.
 
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