Film: Thank the Academy?

THE writers’ strike is settled, the picketing scribes have dispersed to their keyboards, and if the stars feel any pangs of social conscience while strolling the red carpet they’ll have only their fuel-guzzling, globe-warming private jets to blame. The Oscars, in other words, will go on as usual-and for the second year in a row, your faithful critic is playing catch-up, having failed to review three of the Best Picture nominees until now.

Inevitably, the Academy and I don’t quite see eye to eye. If I were picking a suspense film for the final five, for instance, I would take Eastern Promises or Zodiac over Michael Clayton, a George Clooney vehicle that’s torn between two genres-the lawsuit drama and the paranoid thriller-that are ultimately mutually exclusive. In the lawsuit movie, some noble soul-a crusading lawyer, a conscience-stricken corporate drone-leads the charge for justice against a wicked corporation, with briefs and motions flying. (Think The Insider, or Erin Brockovich.) In a paranoid thriller, the justice system offers no relief, because whatever evil there is goes all the way to the top. (Think The Parallax View, or the recent Bourne trilogy.) The lawsuit movie is realistic, if tendentious; the paranoid thriller is fantastic. The lawsuit movie is liberal; the paranoid thriller is radical.

About the Author

Ross Douthat

Ross Douthat is a former National Review contributing editor.

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THE writers’ strike is settled, the picketing scribes have dispersed to their keyboards, and if the stars feel any pangs of social conscience while strolling the red carpet they’ll have only their fuel-guzzling, globe-warming private jets to blame. The Oscars, in other words, will go on as usual-and for the second year in a row, your faithful critic is playing catch-up, having failed to review three of the Best Picture nominees until now.

Inevitably, the Academy and I don’t quite see eye to eye. If I were picking a suspense film for the final five, for instance, I would take Eastern Promises or Zodiac over Michael Clayton, a George Clooney vehicle that’s torn between two genres-the lawsuit drama and the paranoid thriller-that are ultimately mutually exclusive. In the lawsuit movie, some noble soul-a crusading lawyer, a conscience-stricken corporate drone-leads the charge for justice against a wicked corporation, with briefs and motions flying. (Think The Insider, or Erin Brockovich.) In a paranoid thriller, the justice system offers no relief, because whatever evil there is goes all the way to the top. (Think The Parallax View, or the recent Bourne trilogy.) The lawsuit movie is realistic, if tendentious; the paranoid thriller is fantastic. The lawsuit movie is liberal; the paranoid thriller is radical.