Michael Clayton: Finally, a thoughtful film

To put it bluntly, "Michael Clayton" is a film for adults -- of any age.

I'll even go one more: "Michael Clayton" is a film for thinking adults.

Thinking adults don't need shaky cameras to keep them interested or to tell them something intense is happening. They don't need 24 cuts a second to keep their mind from wandering. They don't need hand-held whip-pans to make them feel like they're part of the action; thinking adults are satisfied when an intelligent story is allowed to play out as if the story is the reason for the film's existence.

"Michael Clayton" is a thoughtful film that keeps the audience entranced for two hours without a gun shot, a car chase or a bare breast. It's the kind they "don't make anymore." It's smart, extremely well acted, beautifully photographed in sharp anamorphic widescreen and, with the films we've been given so far this year, a joy to watch.

Michael Clayton (George Clooney) is a "fixer" for a large New York law firm. Though he didn't see himself ending up this way, his job -- which he's good at -- is handling those embarrassing issues that pop up with the firm's clientele.

Clayton describes himself not as an attorney, but as a janitor. The most important requirement for his position is that his moral sensibilities adjust as needed; and if any ethics are at play, they are about loyalty to the firm.

The story begins when his friend and fellow lawyer Arthur Edens (Tom Wilkinson) has a mental breakdown during an important deposition and Clayton is called in to clean up the problem.

Edens has been working on a class-action suit for U/North, the firm's largest client. U/North has been accused of producing agricultural chemicals that are cancerous to humans. When Edens finds out that U/North knew of the danger and has in fact tried to bury the evidence, he begins to secretly build a case for the other side.

As Clayton tries to bring Edens back from mental collapse and career suicide, he has to constantly deal with the problems of his own life as it continues to spiral out of control. He is divorced and slowly losing touch with his son. He has a gambling problem, and he's in debt to loan sharks for a failed business his brother ran into the ground.

Faced with the ultimate decision of doing what's right with the U/North case, or what's right for him, Clayton, the ultimate "fixer," will try a bit of both.

The writer and first-time director Tony Gilroy (writer of all the "Bourne" films) has done an outstanding job with "Michael Clayton." To make such a strong statement against his wall-to-wall action screenplays of the recent past hopefully bodes well for his, and our, future in the cinema.