And when I watched this film through MP4 in a very free afternoon, I realized that it was not what I thought at the beginning, this Michael, not Peter Michael. Strictly speaking, this is a realistic story with legal proceedings as the content, but at the end of the story, a positive and dramatic ending is set. This is the usual method of Hollywood movies, such as the big-mouthed beauty Julia Roberts "Never Compromise".
The film’s director, Tony Gilroy, was originally a well-known screenwriter. His masterpieces are the "Devil's Advocate" and "The Bourne Shadow" series. The ups and downs, compact and sophisticated drama are his consistent style. Therefore, the film’s narrative structure and story layout are in place. Although it is full of a lot of legal content, it does not directly affect the viewing of the movie. However, if you want to understand each link setting, it seems that you can’t achieve this by just watching it once. Understand the level.
The narrative of the film is divided into two sections, and there is a structural change of flashback. Because of this, the unintended monologue, inexplicable plot and difficult legal issues at the beginning of the film are enough to make people confused. In fact, this is a very simple story: Kenner, Bach and Riddien, one of the world's largest law firms, is a diversified company with 75,000 employees and distributed in 62 countries around the world. North provides comprehensive legal services. Both parties have a single 30,000-hour legal service agreement. In the five days before and after the film, a team of 500 lawyers of various colors in the law firm has provided U-north with a long-term infringement lawsuit with a target value of more than 3 billion U.S. dollars for more than six years. Arthur, the chief legal counsel of the group of lawyers, suffered from manic depression for a long time. During the course of the lawsuit, he discovered an internal memo of U-north, which recorded that its main product herbicides are potentially harmful to the human body. Suffering, he decided to turn to war and make the facts public. At the same time, Karen, U-north's new general counsel, instructed commercial spies to assassinate Arthur. The protagonist in the film, Michael Clayton, is a "gatekeeper" who has worked for Kenner Law Firm for 12 years. He has unsatisfactory career, failed investment, heavy debts, divorced husband and wife and lost the custody of children, and family disharmony." "Unlucky", facing almost all "middle-age crises." After Arthur's death, he gradually discovered the inside story of the incident, and after a temporary compromise and escape from the dead, he ended with a detective film to expose the facts and punish the perpetrators.
From the perspective of the story, there are two main lines, involving several main tasks that oppose each other in various crises. The setting of the characters is full of tension, which ensures the compactness and drama of the plot. There are three main roles: Michael (George Clooney), Arthur (Tom Wilkinson), Karen (Tilda Swinton), and everyone has their own pressures and choices. Among them, the most brilliant expression of these contradictions is the opening of Arthur’s monologue of Michael in the police station and the plot switch between the foreground and the backstage when Karen is doing a TV interview. The first part of Arthur’s monologue is lengthy and full of resentment. , Showing her own inner struggles and realistic choices; the latter shows Karen’s integrity and inner tension based on the difference between the state of the stage and behind the scenes. And Clooney’s portrayal of Michael’s role is also relatively successful. From his helpless look at the beginning, his calmness in the face of the incident, to his exuberance naturally and smoothly at the end, he is not trying to be strict with a mature middle-aged man. Rather, it shows the various states of a middle-aged man facing a real crisis.
Every plot in the film is nuanced, including the episode in which the spy assassinated Arthur: the murderer stuns Arthur, then injects the deadly poison from between the toes, and creates the suicide scene of overdose. The whole process is quick and smooth. , Seamless. The legal issues involved in the film are also very professional: there are more than 500 lawyers in such a huge long-term litigation, more than 400 witnesses have been summoned and visited, more than 100 proposals have been revised, 5 trial locations have been changed, and more than The 85,000 files took more than six years, and the plaintiff’s claim for compensation was as high as US$3 billion. Finally, Karen proposed to the U-north board of directors an out-of-court settlement package based on changes in the litigation situation. In addition to this main line, the film also touches on minor legal issues such as the priority of housing leases, the legal procedures for the merger of law firms, the business of the "Nurse" of the law firm, and the criminal defense of traffic accidents. The internal memorandum signed by the former general counsel became vital evidence to prove the lethality of the herbicide, which would make U-north lose the entire lawsuit, and the result was not just a US$3 billion in damages. The responsible person will also be subject to criminal charges.
Among them, Michael's precocious son narrated the plot in a novel (The King and the Summon) to Michael and Arthur respectively, and it is also very important. The content of that novel implies a tense issue of fate: acceptance or resistance. And Arthur formally included the copy service receipt of the memo in this novel. When Michael accidentally discovered the receipt, it reminded me of the "Bible" with a small hammer in "Shawshank's Salvation." The significance of this novel in the film is like the Bible in "Xiao". It is not only a prop for hiding important objects, but also a carrier for indicating spiritual meaning. In "Xiao", the page where the small hammer is hidden is "Exodus", which indicates a successful escape from prison. In this film, the issues of the novel herald the moral choices of Arthur and Michael. In addition, there is a sentence that I value very much in the film. Marty, the partner of the law firm, reminds Michael: forget it, God will not let you be as good as you remembered! In fact, both Michael and Arthur in the film are reflecting on the past few years. After recognizing the problem, they made their own choices in life.
Similarly, the lengthy and delicate dialogue in the film is wonderful, especially Arthur’s monologue facing Michael, which is wonderful: "…Because it's years! It's lives! And the numbers are making me dizzy and, you know, now, instead of trying not to come, I'm trying not to think,and I can't stop.I msen,is this me? Am I this freak organism that has sent here to sleep and eat and defend this one horrific chain of carcinogenic molecules? Is that my destiny? Is that my fate?..." This is an inner struggle based on personal experience and moral appeal, and it is also a keynote of the whole movie, that is, to discuss the ethical and moral connotation of lawyers, which is to borrow the law to help the unscrupulous Do employers escape their responsibilities and earn generous commissions, or do they not succumb to interests to maintain justice?
The film presents an extreme social reality-the dirty reality under the social picture of a country ruled by law, such as the social reality revealed in "The Devil's Spokesperson" and "The Firm": Law Firms Legal service agencies are actually embarrassed with unscrupulous employers who abandon morals and legal constraints. Is it just in line with the law or more in line with justice? This is an ethical controversy that has emerged with the emergence of the lawyer industry. In this film, the basic controversy is extreme, namely, the choice between justice and injustice. In fact, in terms of ethical appeals, ordinary people are not too concerned about this choice. Many disputes, as a viewer, do not want the lawyers in the film to abide by the employer’s interests and violate the substantive justice. In actual lawyer business, abiding by the interests of employers is actually an important professional principle. In theory, lawyers only need to make efforts at the level of legality. As for substantive justice, theoretically it should also be reflected in legality. Of course, this is a perfect state that exists only in theory. , Reality often runs counter to this. The legal environment set in the film is no longer just Hollywood's stereotyped prejudice. In the consciousness of ordinary people, most people think that such a situation is consistent with reality. Therefore, people expect a positive moral choice to emerge and be able to overcome "evil"-in fact, the "main theme" of the world is similar. The film's final enthusiasm choice was implemented in Arthur's successor, Michael. When Michael discovered the memo copied by Arthur, he made the "right" decision. First he renewed his contract with the law firm to repay his debts, and then escaped the spy's assassination dramatically, and finally assisted the police in obtaining direct evidence, which made the case clear. , And then got into the taxi alone, waved 50 dollars, let the driver drive casually, with a confident, slow and proud expression.
On the whole, this is a very detailed legal feature film, but the changes in the narrative structure and the cumbersome details will cause people to understand obstacles. In order to write this article, I have read some plots more than five times.
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