Sydney Pollack is a man who loves big money conspiracy drama. Take a look at him; he exudes that aura of high-society; he looks like that guy who wears the Armani suits behind a big mahogany desk with the gold nameplate in the corner office on the top floor of the tallest building overlooking a city he knows he’s better than. With credits in films like The Interpreter, Michael Clayton, as well as The Firm, if it’s a high stakes thriller revolving around law or government, he’s probably got a hand in it somewhere.
He directed The Firm, John Grisham’s law thriller revolving around Harvard hotshot Mitch McDeere (Tom Cruise) who, not even fresh out of college yet, gets the offer of his dreams from a law office that specializes in “too good to be true.” Being pampered with a Mercedes, a new home, a great salary, and the paying off of student loans, Mitch instantly reaches that level that normally takes years of rummaging through the dirt to achieve, even for a Harvard grad. Dragging along his wife Abby (Jeanne Tripplehorn), they head for Memphis, Tennessee to live their life of luxury which doesn’t seem to consist of any real goals except for Mitch to get a six-digit income.
Helping him get accustomed to everything is Avery (Gene Hackman), a trusted veteran of the firm who couldn’t fake having a lust for life if it stripped in front of him and gave him a lap dance. He’s charismatic enough and likes his job, but I had a lot of difficulty believing he had a passion for anything. The normal Gene Hackman ferocity was non-existent here and he serves as merely that obstacle to get passed to help push the story.
Things take a turn for the worse quickly as Mitch hears about the untimely deaths of some of the other up-and-coming lawyers in the firm and just short flashing it in neon lights on the front door, the firm makes it clear they had something to do with it. So begins the conspiracy theory movie that gets Pollack’s tail wagging.
Cruise, as always, is overly-frantic, with that goofy “wtf” face like he just watched The Human Centipede (ya, like I’d know), but his character is a smart guy and winds through the twists and turns, playing the angles to find the information that he needs while…miraculously being ignored by the company until the final moments. You never really get to meet Mitch except that’s he’s good at what he does and he’s focused on what he’s doing. He has moments of sweetness, but the story has so much depth it forgets to instill that in any of the characters.
There are parts that I really enjoyed about The Firm and things that drove me up the wall. The story would have been amazing if it just kept a steady pace throughout, as well as gave me at least a LITTLE taste of victory after investing 150 minutes into it. Character development would have been great, but the film just preferred to keep throwing new people into it instead. Simply put, too much story, not enough emphasis on why I should care about it; it just had tunnel vision from start to finish.
To close this out, I have to mention it again, because it’s the second time this week it’s been just plain off. A friend of mine last night told me that “filmmakers need to learn that music is a character too,” which is so so true. I’ve always been a fan of piano…but damn was I sick of it here. Perhaps because it was in Memphis, the score is solely piano and performed in a way that reminds me of those old 1920s detective stories with the dimly lit rooms that can only be illuminated by the sparkle of a shiny red dress worn by an overly voluptuous damsel in distress. The fact that the score was nominated for an Academy Award bothers me, because it just didn’t fit this film at all. The moments of revelation were met with the soft twinkling of keys where usually the string instruments shine and add suspense. This just seemed too close to a low budget 1960s cop show and didn’t help the experience at all to the point where I was literally cringing in my seat.
Overall, a relatively good watch, but it just couldn’t live up to the standards it built for itself. It looked more complex than it actually was, couldn’t keep pace and completely ignored the importance of ambiance and establishing mood. I teetered on a 7 because I respect Sydney Pollack, but I compare it to his other works and know he’s so much better than this. Sorry bud, for a two and a half hour conspiracy drama, I want a whole lot more. 6 dustbusters out of 10.
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