Shiva, the God of Death

 

I.

There are lawyers in Tony Gilroy's movie 'Michael Clayton' who are called Janitors. It's easy to guess why. People (rich folks that is) mess around and janitors/lawyers clean up the mess. But one of the janitors has had enough of it.

I like the way the movie starts. Right from the beginning, the director tells us what we see is not all, for it doesn't match what we hear (Arthur's voice-over). There is more to what we are looking at. The voice-over is a bit shaky, but certain and we see a law firm swarmed with people who seem to know what they're doing.

Following this we see George Clooney driving in a car, angry but trying to control himself. He pulls over and goes up a hill to get a closer look at some horses. And as you are about to think this isolated part of heaven is tranquillizing to Clooney (and you), his car explodes in the far bottom left side of the background.

Well, see the rest of the story in the movie, if you already haven't.

II.

a. I'm not one of Clooney's fans but he is brilliant here. Playing the role of a man, on the verge of breakdown (any kind you think of, economical, nervous, friend-wise, familial, job-related, you name it) is not that easy. For the entire movie, we hear about the bits and pieces of his life. He is definitely not a hero. All the good things he does in the movie encompass helping one and only one friend, and his great care for the one and only son he has who doesn't even live with him. He seems to have been on the wrong track for so long that nothing can be done to save him, and nothing actually does.

b. I am a big fan of 'Tilda swinton'. She is, and always has been, brilliant (watch War Zone or The Garden and you'll see). She has nothing to do with all those lawyers/bitches who are in Hollywood movies, killing themselves to show how bad/bitchy they are. Just for the sake of comparison recall 'Gina Gershon' in The Insider (she was the Achilles' hill of that nice movie, in my opinion).

Karen Crowder is not one of the 'ladies who lunch'. She's got discipline. She knows what she wants. She makes decisions about people's murder faster than she decides on her clothes. In the world we live in, Karen is a goddess.

III.

I already told you how the movie starts. Right after the explosion, there's a flashback to days before. Gilroy is in no hurry to tell us the whole story. We are shown the corruption of the whole law system. Not one person seems to care. Everybody is in for deceit and back-stabbing. The only good guy here (Arthur played by 'Tom Wilkinson' between madness and purgation) transforms from "Shiva, the god of death" to a loving, caring and battling warrior of the oppressed, for a million reasons other than morality or bad conscience. He should be under medication but refuses, he falls in love with one of 'the oppressed', he has recently lost his wife to a disease, and her daughter doesn't even talk to him; besides all this, everyone wants to lock him out. Clooney, in a beautiful monolog tells him, "janitor to janitor", that nobody is there to help him. The part in which they decide to kill him is shocking. If memory serves well, the good guys of all movies, the ones I remember right now, are decided to be murdered in closed half-lit rooms. Here the decision is made in the street, where almost any casual observer can hear. And the murder scene itself is so cold and quiet that, for a second, frightens you. Is it really so simple?

IV.

The ending is also good. The janitor becomes a warrior (Shiva becomes Vishnu) but not for ever, not even for any moral cause; other than taking revenge for his friend's death.

When Clayton tells Karen Crowder he is gonna blow the whistle on her, she is wordless, defenseless, and Clayton starts walking towards the exit, with the camera traveling back, showing us both his tired and disgusted face in the foreground and at the same time her collapse/disintegration in the background. You may think Clayton is coming toward us (salvation, redemption, catharsis and all that jazz) but he gets on an escalator and goes down while we stay up and watch him 'going down'.

Nobody is safe here.

P.S. I have seen the trailer of Gilroy's lastest movie, 'Duplicity' or something. I guess Hollywood is on her way to make another 'Soderberg', my term for wasted genius.