A Civil Action Rated: PG-13 A Review By: Ryan Davis
What happens when a greedy, cut throat personal injury lawyer gets a heart of gold? This is the simple basis to one of the year's best pictures. Although nicely written and directed by Steven Zaillian, the Academy Award winning writer of Schindler's List, `A Civil Action' doesn't rely on its artistic style or atmosphere, but mainly on the acting power of its incredible ensemble.
`A Civil Action' is a true story, based on the best selling novel of the same name, by Jonathan Harr. The film introduces us to Jan Schlichtmann(John Travolta), a rich and powerful, personal injury attorney. He has found a case in which two powerful corporations may have dumped toxins that accidentally poisoned the water in a small town. The water may have caused eight children to develop leukemia, and their families want to know the truth.
Jan, after much deliberation, decides to take the case against the companies. So he and his law partners (which include the brilliant William H. Macy, among others), begin what is to become their most expensive and trying case. But the corporations are not going down easy, they have their own cut throat lawyers. Jerome Facher(Robert Duvall) is one of them and he knows every trick in the book. As they get further along in the case, they get further and further into debt. They even begin to doubt if they will win the case at all.
The film runs brilliantly for an hour and a half but as it nears the end, due to time constraints I am guessing, they begin to cover too much too fast. The end happens far too quickly, and leaves you feeling unsatisfied. If they had added fifteen minutes to the film, this could have been corrected.
That being said, the movie is more performance powered than story driven. Travolta is simply marvelous as Jan. Upstaged only by Duvall's perfectly executed, heartless corporate lawyer.
All in all the film is great, terrific performances and for the most part, great writing and directing. One of the top ten movies of 1998.
Grade: A
Ryan Davis rjdavis@ezy.net rjdavis@ccisp.net
My Movie Review Archives: http://us.imdb.com/M/reviews_by?Ryan+Davis
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