Fearless Writer ... Reviews

Stars: Keanu Reeves, Al Pacino, Charlize Theron

Director: Taylor Hackford

Flush with birthday cash and keen to experience some quality cinema, I had a quick browse of the top 250 on imdb.com, noted down a couple of likely titles, then headed for the nearest JB Hi-Fi. One of the titles I acquired was The Devil’s Advocate and I threw it on one hungover Sunday afternoon.

For what is a fairly complex film, the basic premise of The Devil’s Advocate is quite, erm, basic. Young Florida lawyer Kevin Lomax (Reeves) is something of a phenomenon, having won over 50 cases straight. It is ostensibly this record that attracts the attention of New York law firm Milton Chadwick & Waters, which offers him big bucks to join its ranks. Kevin and his wife Mary (Theron) are put up in a huge swanky apartment and paid more money than they know what to do with.

But there’s something hinky about Milton Chadwick & Waters – especially its chief partner, John Milton (Pacino). He too has a remarkable win-loss record, and as Kevin soon learns, his new boss apparently doesn’t sleep and has quite a way with women despite his average looks and diminutive stature. In fact, it soon becomes clear that Kevin has been hired by the devil himself to get acquittals for some of the least desirable elements of society. Kevin’s unhealthy obsession with his work and her lonely, isolated lifestyle begins to take its toll on Mary, who breaks down and is committed. And just wait until Kevin finds out what John Milton has in store for him.

Interestingly, in the period between first looking up The Devil’s Advocate on imdb.com and watching it, it’s rating has fallen to a 7.1, pushing it out of the top 250. This is fine by me, because although it has a superb script and polished performances, it somehow adds up to less than the sum of its parts. The centre section, while still doing enough to make the viewer watch on, becomes ponderous – it’s clearly building to a dazzling climax, but wends and rambles and philosophises its way there.

One other criticism needs to be fired at director Taylor Hackford, who for some reason decided the final ten-minute confrontation between Kevin and John needed to be shouted. What could have been played for mounting aggression and tension winds up as a tiresome, expository screaming match that robs the climax of some of its power.

Yet The Devil’s Advocate also possesses manifold strengths – Pacino’s gifted performance being number one with a bullet (or several bullets, as it turns out). Charlize Theron does an excellent job of spiralling into madness and despair (actors tend to overdramatise mental illness, but her descent is perfectly weighted) and even Keanu Reeves manages to strip away most of the bark from his classically wooden acting and come close to something like real emotion. Oh, and those who are familiar with Paradise Lost by John Milton (hence the name of Pacino’s character) and Dante’s Inferno will be able to play an intellectual game of ‘spot the reference’ if the narrative isn’t holding their interest.

Without doubt, The Devil’s Advocate is blue ribbon cinema, but as for being a classic on par with say Pulp Fiction or Chinatown – well, you’ll have a devil of a time trying to convince me of that.

4/5 stars