George Clooney

Steven Soderbergh’s ‘The Informant!’ Puts Matt Damon on a Wire

PatrickMcD — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 06:09:55 -0600

Rating: 3.5/5.0

CHICAGO – Behind every great fortune lies a great crime, as the saying goes. In director Steven Soderbergh’s “The Informant!,” he and Matt Damon carve out a satire where the “crime” becomes entangled with the larger issues of “justice.”

In this based-on-fact scenario, Damon plays Mark Whitacre, who famously cooperated in the 1990s with the FBI as a whistle blowing insider to the Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) price fixing scandal. As a high-level executive at ADM, Whitacre was privy to meetings – many that he set up – where the price of a basic food ingredient was fixed through international skullduggery.

The Whole Truth: Matt Damon as Mark Whitarce in ‘The Informant!’
Photo credit: Copyright © Warner Bros. Pictures, All Rights Reserved

As the pressure builds and the FBI (as portrayed through agents played by Scott Bakula and Joel McHale) needs more evidence, the increasingly erratic Whitarce begins to unravel in unpredictable ways. The closer they all get to breaking the price fixing case, the more apparent it becomes that Whitarce will assure that his backside will be protected, either through passing misinformation or his own scandalous behavior.

This is a comedy, and a quite funny one at that. When the deadly human sin of greed starts to emerge, Damon’s bloated character responds with a variety of tics and self delusions, classically illustrated by director Soderbergh with a basic narration track that exposes Whitarce’s unbalanced sanity.

His random thoughts include (as voiced by Damon) what if there was a TV show about a guy who splits into two and calls himself, and spends the rest of the hour chasing down the other?

Scott Burn’s screenplay contains other absurd gems, especially in context with the playground antics of the price fixers. And it does expose the FBI and the federal lawyers as callous, when the stress to convict the fixers becomes more important than protecting the clearly overmatched Whitarce.

The FBI: Scott Bakula and Joel McHale as agents with Matt Damon in ‘The Informant!’
Photo credit: Copyright © Warner Bros. Pictures, All Rights Reserved

The Soderbergh touch is also felt in the sly satire. The title graphics and Marvin Hamlisch score are both rooted in the 1970s anti-hero movies, so much so that a colleague wondered if Hamlisch was in on the joke.

The background casting winks at the camera as well several times, as Thomas F. Wilson (Biff from “Back to the Future”), Patton Oswalt and other familiar comedians have cameos as straight-laced authority figures and co-workers.

Where The Informant! doesn’t work as well is in the languid story pacing and superfluous nature of Damon’s character. In the film’s eagerness to indict everyone, the moral of the ending is driven home again and again, and even the expected where-are-they-now graphics as a epilogue seems extracurricular.

But in the current debate on reform in big business, a good old fashion satire where we meet the enemy, and they are us, is all the more appropriate as the real American Dream continues unwinding in the post millennium.

’’The Informant!” opens everywhere September 18th and features Matt Damon, Scott Bakula, Joel McHale, Melanie Lynskey, Patton Oswalt and Thomas F. Wilson, directed by Steven Soderbergh

By PATRICK McDONALD
Senior Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

Despite Stylistic Inconsistency, George Clooney’s ‘Leatherheads’ Feels Good

HollywoodChicago.com — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 00:46:42 -0600

CHICAGO – George Clooney’s latest film, “Leatherheads,” brings light-hearted, screwball antics and slapstick blunders to the screen with a romantic tale that tells how professional football came to be.

Set in 1925, fading football star Dodge Connelly (George Clooney) attempts to save the professional game by recruiting a college football hero to save the sport. The film begins with a game of ragtag football in a stadium shared by cattle where oddball plays and dirty tricks are welcomed.

George Clooney (left) in “Leatherheads”.
Photo credit: IMDb

Few fans come to the games and barely follow the sport – due to their often illegal consumption of booze – but when Dodge is told the team is bankrupt and the sponsors are selling, he’s determined to find a solution for his beloved team (the Duluth Bulldogs).

Dodge recruits Carter Rutherford (John Krasinski) – the Princeton football star and a war hero – to join his team and attempts to propel professional football forward by capturing the hearts of the country.

While Dodge is working to promote Carter’s good looks, amazing athletic ability and heroism, spitfire reporter Lexie Littleton (Renée Zellweger) is asked by her newspaper to discredit the war hero story by getting close to him and exposing the truth.

As Lexie hunts for her story, Dodge and Carter compete for her affection. Funny banter and mishaps galore ensue between the captain and his star player.

Renée Zellweger and George Clooney in “Leatherheads”.
Photo credit: IMDb

The story culminates when Lexie exposes Carter as a war hero fraud and Dodge loses his star to jealousy, which perpetuates major changes to the sport of professional football.

Typical romantic comedy calamities take place and Dodge is forced to choose between the sport he once loved – with pig-in-a-poke and crusty-bob plays – or the new woman he has fallen in love with.

Clooney and Zellweger bring great energy to the film and their back-and-forth flirtations keep the movie enthusiastic.

Lines like “I’m just practicing my American accent” to ream Clooney for not listening and “you’re only as young as the women you feel” to explain age differences are riddled throughout and bring poppy yet naturally delivered humor to the story.

George Clooney shooting “Leatherheads”.
Photo credit: IMDb

Krasinski delivers a commendable performance as the pretty-boy football star and flawlessly follows suit with Clooney’s screwball sense of humor.

Set in the roaring 1920s with prohibition and World War I themes weaved throughout, the production design is impeccable and undoubtedly places you in the stadium with the crowd. Appropriate costumes and jazzy tunes make this film not only historically accurate but colorful as well.

On the other hand, the story – just like the ragtag football team it follows – is a bit rugged and disjointed.

Director Clooney takes us into a heavy-dialogued script that’s reminiscent of past Joel and Ethan Coen comedies and leads us back and forth between romantic comedy antics and slapstick horseplay. This disjointedness would be acceptable except that it causes inconsistency with its overall pace and rhythm.

At times, the film drags on around predictable plot turns and loses its overall focus. This makes it drowsy and leaves you wondering why we’re watching these excessive and often tiresome scenes.

Aside from some momentum snares and trite turns, though, the film succeeds in the entertainment department. If you’re looking for a movie to make you laugh and take your mind off the present day, this film will accomplish both.

“Leatherheads” opened on April 4, 2008.

Click here for our full “Leatherheads” image gallery!

By ALLISON PITACCIO
Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
allee@hollywoodchicago.com

‘Michael Clayton’ is Adult Antidote to Torrent of Monotonous Gobbledygook

HollywoodChicago.com — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 14:56:52 -0600

CHICAGO – Don’t be fooled by its formulaic, Hollywoodspeak tagline.

“The truth can be adjusted” is the “Michael Clayton” way of saying this film has rammed in a whole hell of a lot more than you might first presume and is about to blindside you with everything a picture-perfect Hollywood product should be.

George Clooney in “Michael Clayton”.
Photo courtesy of IMDb
An opulent, all-star cast as in “The Departed” sometimes yields the film of the year. At other times, the failure of that resolve can make financiers suicidal.

In the case of “Michael Clayton,” writer/director Tony Gilroy weaves the commanding George Clooney, flawlessly fanatical (and sometimes streaking) Tom Wilkinson, tautly corporate Tilda Swinton and the always-on-top-of-his-game Sydney Pollack into a film that pays its weight in gold.

Tom Wilkinson in “Michael Clayton”.
Photo courtesy of IMDb
Executive producers Clooney, Steven Soderbergh, James Holt and Anthony Minghella either have it too easy or yet again know when lead is about to be fashioned into a mountain of bullion. Clooney himself carries the show in an exquisitely intricate story that ably pulls off the art of the circular plot.

Much in the same way “Pulp Fiction” starts with the end and circles back once the middle has been teemed in, Clooney in his inextricable role as a “fixer” of all things crooked plunges you into the wildly provocative world of corporate America.

Tilda Swinton in “Michael Clayton”.
Photo courtesy of IMDb
While I only have love for the hilarity of late from “Superbad,” “Knocked Up” and the like, the gravity of “Michael Clayton” – much like this year’s “Fracture” with Anthony Hopkins – is the adult antidote to a torrent of monotonous gobbledygook devoid of poignant messaging.

A serious film with a serious plot, serious actors and an imperative statement, I thank the film gods it’s wedged into 2007 history because the year would have been lacking without it.

The fictional agrochemical company U/North and its looming calamity is at the heart of the film, which opens limited on Friday and goes wide on Oct. 12. It doesn’t take much fantasizing for U/North to smack of similiar, real-life corporate behemoths.

Sydney Pollack in “Michael Clayton”.
Photo courtesy of IMDb
While you could imagine crisis litigation going much like this through the realization of a potentially deadly byproduct at the expense of silver linings and golden executive parachutes, “Michael Clayton” importantly brings into the limelight the U.S. corporate machine while mercilessly illuminating what happens in back alleys.

Though lawyers certainly get the bad wrap of being blood-sucking money fiends, it’s less realized that in a courtroom their primary role is as a well-studied actor. It’s the side that not only tells the truth but tells the better truth that ultimately wolfs down all the cake.

“I’m the guy you buy!” isn’t just a climatic line Clooney uses to slap Swinton upside her head. It’s actually the catastrophic revelation that high-powered suits can freely and dispassionately ride that train of thinking today and only sometimes get caught along the way.

By ADAM FENDELMAN
Editor-in-Chief
HollywoodChicago.com
adam@hollywoodchicago.com