Reviewed by Lamar Kukuk
3/30/09
Few women have ever had the
pure starpower of Julia Roberts. When combined with a worthy role
(star turns in Pretty Woman, Sleeping with the Enemy and
Erin Brockovich, supporting roles in Flatliners, Charlie
Wilson's War and the otherwise hopeless Hook), nobody's better.
But whether you want to blame her own taste in projects, the scarcity of
good roles for women or the fact that in recent years her attention has
been more on family than career, we haven't seen the full measure of her
talent as often as you'd think. So even when the vehicle's questionable
(My Best Friend's Wedding, The Mexican), I'm always happy
to see her turn the burners on, and she does just that in Duplicity,
a too-cool-for-school caper flick from Michael
Clayton writer-director Tony Gilroy. As in Clayton,
he's primarily interested in the soullessness of the modern business world.
But unlike that heavy drama, Duplicity is supposed to be fun and
as such finds itself in desperate need of someone to root for. It's
fun to watch Roberts and co-star Clive Owen strike sparks and the plot
is undeniably clever, but the movie often drags and I ultimately felt no
emotional investment in the outcome. The stars (and supporting player
Paul Giamatti) are in fine form, and as such Duplicity is for buffs
only, which I just happen to be.
Five years ago, MI-6's Ray
Koval (Clive Owen) had a chance meeting at a party in Dubai with the CIA's
Claire Stenwick (Julia Roberts). Of course, he only found out she
was CIA after they'd slept together, she'd drugged him and he found himself
short a briefcase full of classified data. Years later, they meet
again: he's working for private company Equikom as a spy against
their rival Burkett-Randle, for whom she works as a double-agent, with
her real loyalty toward Equikom. So, what Globally competitive, live
and death industry are these companies engaged in? You know, soap,
shampoo, lotions, that sort of thing. But it's life and death to
CEOs Howard Tully (Tom Wilkinson for Burkett-Randle) and Richard Garsik
(Paul Giamatti for Equikom), and they'll spare no expense to learn what
the other is up to. Ray is to be Claire's handler, a situation neither
cares for, but their shared history makes for easy blackmail and they're
stuck with each other. Or so it seems. A series of flashbacks
slowly reveal that there's more in play, and as Claire and Ray close in
on Tully's secret new product, just who they're stealing the info for remains
a mystery.
What makes Ray and Claire
perfect for each other is that they've pulled so many dirty tricks they
can't even begin to trust another person, and at least each knows that
the other feels the same way. Their dance of attraction and mutual
distrust has a lot of zing, especially since Owen plays frustration so
well (I mentioned last month that his bubbling rage became kinda comical
against the inertia of The International:
here, at least, it's SUPPOSED to be funny). I wish we'd have seen
these characters in a better movie, one where their con games had a basis
other than a desire to make money. But even as it is, I was entertained
every time they were on-screen together or with Giamatti, whose Type A+
tycoon is a snarling hoot. Pity Gilroy relies on a single, kinda
painful sequence at the beginning of the movie to establish the Tully vs.
Garsik rivalry: Giamatti and Wilkinson never so much as exchange
a line of dialog in a movie built on their characters' mutual hatred.
Wilkinson does all he's asked to do, but the role is surprisingly muted.
Of course, much of Duplicity
is muted, perhaps because it finds corporate espionage so much more interesting
than I do. I wrack my brain for a truly satisfying movie about con
artists where the motivator of the plot is simple greed rather than revenge
and I can't really think of one. But cold, hard cash is all that
keeps Duplicity's wheels spinning, and I honestly didn't feel any
particular rooting interest in whether Claire and Ray pull off their scheme.
It's never a good thing to think a movie would be best enjoyed by AIG executives...
There's not much comedy in
Gilroy's filmography: he took a crack at the Shane Black school of
action by co-writing the ever-so-underrated Jamie Foxx vehicle Bait,
and that's about it. Here, his directorial style is pretty much the
same as in Michael Clayton: slick,
sterile, distancing. Even his writing is distancing here, relying
on a too-clever snaking structure that keeps cutting to more and more recent
flashbacks to previous meetings between Ray and Claire that explain to
death what a simple “ta-da!” moment could have accomplished at any time.
Luckily, as a director, he once again gets good work from his actors, and
the trenches of both Equikom and Burkett-Randle are filled with solid,
lived-in performances.
So, yes, Duplicity
would be better if it were more overtly comic, more passionate, more populist.
But it is a star vehicle in the truest sense, and has put the right drivers
behind the wheel. And when it comes to leading roles for Julia Roberts,
beggars can't be choosers. |
