I thought it was great but felt unsatisfied by the ending (the closing credits in the taxi, I liked a lot).

The poker scene, however brief, was much more realistic than they usually are in movies, and Rounders' writer Brian Koppelman is credited as "Player #2."

This is also the only movie I am aware of to feature two of Roseanne's sister's boyfriends (Clooney and Michael O'Keefe) in the same movie!

Saw this today, liked it a lot. Wilkinson was remarkable, surely a more memorable performance than Arkin's Oscar-winning performance of last year.

My wife brought up something I would have missed. She kept whispering to me that Clooney wasn't wearing a coat in the cold. Finally, in the last scene, he puts a coat on as he leaves the building. Because he could finally feel something?

My favorite scenes were when Wilkinson sees the ad for the corporation on the big screen in Times Square and when Clooney talks to his son in the car.

Terrific entertainment, thoughtful and intelligent, despite the "banality of evil" part that was indeed cliched. Well worth seeing.

Gable-Redford-Clooney. Maybe the best comparison is Warren Beatty?

"Wilkinson is fantastic."

Definitely. A truly memorable performance.

My fave, loved it.

I'm very excited for this one. One of the first Oscar season movies this year to actually get good reviews and word of mouth. Great cast.

i'll third this. almost felt a tear while watching this part.

How big did Ken Howard get from the White Shadow (one of my favorite shows as a kid)?! He must be well over 300 pounds and looks like a total alky.

Loved the movie.

I was really impressed with this movie. I saw it basically on a whim, and I'm very glad I did.

Great performances all around, good story, and well-developed enough that at the end, I wasn't sure which way he was going to go.

-jet

Agree w/ everyone else here. I loved how his son had his head tilted back, you could see him taking it all in and for the first time the son was actually believing what his father was saying and at the right time too b/c it wasn't about getting to the movies or reading a book it was about the kid. Absolutely loved that scene, made me smile.

Yeah, awesome movie, best of the year, etc. One question--was it just me, or was Clooney wearing eyeliner? Seriously.

Wait, that's the same guy? He's now the archetypal jowly corporate villain...

My wife noticed it too. She asked me about it afterwards, but I didn't notice it. She speculated that perhaps he has something wrong with his eye(s) that requires make-up?

Nice catch. Notice that the detective from NYPD who clears Clooney that the apartment is sealed is Osborne (David Zayas) from the 'municipal' game in Rounders as well?

Anyhow, the hype about this movie is for real. Truly integral film that I connected with because of the implied long odds of living a life reaching for Authenticity in matters of grave importance. The 'madness' of Tom Wilkinson's character in Michael Clayton is Howard Beale (Network) meets Jeffrey Wigand (Russell Crowe-The Insider). Mad genius is more like it...

*** Spoilerish ***

I disagree about the ending. The introspective cab ride is perfect for a character found in unfamiliar redemption amongst the carcasses he usually directs attention away from (not to mention the audience reflecting upon it). If what you don't like about the ending is that his character is incongruent in flipping, then that is an oversight. It is a bold statement on the power of man to destroy egoic/structural boundaries to restore a greater order to the world within/around him. Aren't these boundaries one in the same? Well done by Gilroy here.

Not the box office draw, but will give Clooney the nod for nomination Oscar Best Actor. Wilkinson may deservedly see the tap as well... And Tilda Swinton. Give Gilroy the nod too. And the movie itself. Damn, that was good!

Saw it tonight, great movie.

Hi Dom,
I saw this movie tonight on your recommendation. I saw a lot in it, on many different levels.

Warning ******* Possible Spoilers beyond this point *******

What I watched was a couple of characters grappling with the age old problem of man vs. machine.

By machine, I mean the apparatus, the system, that has been set up to govern human interaction. Both the players, Clayton, and Edens (wonder about the symbology of that name?) are willful participants in all the injustice that a cold and calculated legal system can dish out. They've made careers of it. They thrive on it. Edens suffers some kind of mental break (well, we think it's a mental break, but I don't think it is) that gives him a vision of the world that he has not been able to see in some time.

You see, I think that both men have lost their humanity along the way. It was somewhere back in a calculated decision they made some time ago. Edens just rediscovers his and decides that regardless of the rules of the system and the mechanations of the machine, he is going to take an unpredictable human action and to hell with the consequences. To me, he is the most vivid character in the whole film.

Clayton, on the other hand must die, figuratively, to figure out what Edens truly saw. The opening sequence is literally the moment of Claytons death. All his paradigms are gone after that point. Boundaries shifted, expanded. The ending of the movie is his human action. That is, payback against the machine. The whole machine, even the part that nutured him into what he became. From that moment on, he will have to define himself by standards that the rest of the world doesn't understand.

I identify with Clayton. This has been a year where many of my paradigms have fallen away.

I caught the last show tonight (Tuesday) at the big 26-plex across the freeway from Hawaiian Gardens. Five minutes into the movie I'm the only one in the theater! For me this is perfect.

After the aforementioned five minutes some teenage couple comes in and sits down about midway back. A few minutes later I see them pause as they walk out looking at their tickets under the glow of the exit light. Guess they got the wrong screen. I watched the movie in total silence

Loved it but one thing I think they got wrong is described below in white:

After they loop back to the scene where Clooney's car gets bombed he rushes back down to the car and throws his cell, ring and watch into the flaming wreckage. This supposedly is proof he died in the crash. Wouldn't there at least be bones left?

~ Rick

"both men have lost their humanity along the way."

Absolutely. My wife caught this in the fact that Clooney never wore a coat in the cold weather. Not until the last scene when he leaves the building. It was the first time he could feel anything.

A lot of posts in this thread, and not one person who didn't care for the movie. Not that we're the be-all-end-all of movie mavens here, but significiant, I think, that we're unanimous in liking it.

Rick:

Possible explanation in white:
I think he felt the bad guys would just go up to the car to see what's what and might see his stuff and assume he was in the car.

We got to the theater just about at starting time, in Century City mid-day on Sunday, where I thought it would be crowded. But it was only about 1/3 full. Still, I think this movie might have legs from good word-of-mouth.

Honestly, my only problem with the movie was how "trixy" the fixers were.

Not really a spoiler so I'll say "Too bad he didn't have an order or half eaten ribs or chicken wings with him"


Hopefully. Sometimes just the name doesn't help generate a good start. Michael Clayton sounds like some English gentleman affair to the average moviegoer. OTOH, I'll bet The Departed got a lot of people thinking they might be seeing a horror movie!

~ Rick

Another possible explanation in white:
Clayton could have (and rightly so) suspected that they had put some sort of tracking device on him, and he decided to get rid of all of the prime suspects for a bug (phone/watch/etc)

nice take, Sub...

4.5/5 stars. Awesome movie, I actually left the theatre feeling a bit depressed and sorry for some of the characters.

Three days later, we were still talking about it. A truly memorable movie.