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Summary: Liberal Cinema Not Dead After All
Review: If like me, you're something of a sucker for socially conscious movies, flicks with their hearts in the right place, then A CIVIL ACTION is definitely a must-see for you. In terms of facing complex moral and legal issues (not always the same thing, in fact often miles apart), writer director Steven Zaillian seldom takes the easy way out. The film rings true on those fronts--although he does frequenly engage in a kind of cinematic shorthand that compresses time and events and I do believe there are some of those "composite characters" so ubiquitous in true-life films.Still it's commendable effort. If you like courtroom drama at all, you will appreciate the wheeling and dealing and the high stakes human drama going down here. The cast list suggests that there will be some quirky characterization going on, if not a downright acting feast. Any movie that boasts Robert Duvall, James Gandolfini, William H. Macy and John Lithgow can't go wrong on the acting front, right? Well, yes and no, they all turn in fine performances. Only Macy and Duvall get to do anything really quirky though. Others have suggested that John Travolta is somewhat miscast here. I disagree. He makes a believable transition from money grubbing ambulance chaser to impassioned champion of the common man (woman and CHILD). Not easy to do in the space of a couple of hours. Jonathan Harr had over 500 pages to tell that tale. Harr tells it better, but Travolta and Zaillian do a credible job, given the limitations of cinema. A CIVIL ACTION is a worthy effort. Certainly not perfect, but many will find it provocative. Most will find it well worth their time. These days, when you seldom see anything like the classic socially conscious filmmaking, so common from the 30s to the 70s, it's heartening to see a film this intelligent and authentic. (Why can't all these notorious Hollywood Liberals make a halfway decent liberal film anymore?) This is a film well worth your time.
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Summary: A good movie, with great performances and interesting story
Review: A Civil action is a solid movie with some good performances and a story that does not cave into Hollywood's propensity for clichés. I was not expecting a whole lot from this movie, so I was pleasantly surprised. It offers an intriguing story based on real events surrounding the contamination of the water supply in the small, industrial Boston suburb. However, it seems to be at least as much if not more so about the legal process than about the suit itself. Travolta, who plays the prosecuting attorney, Jan Schlichtmann, before the trial was a successful was a not very respected personal injury lawyer (A.K.A. ambulance chaser). During the progression of the story, he narrates advice to the audience as if a he is a law professor. It is this instruction that he himself does not follow and thus leads to trouble for himself and his clients. The movie, in this way, is almost as much about the seemingly illogical logic behind litigation then it is about the individual case it portrays. Travolta does an excellent job as the attorney who feels he constantly has something to prove to the corporate monstrosities of Beatrice and Grace and their Harvard-educated attorneys (Schlichtmann, it turns out, graduated from lowly Northwestern). Robert Duvall plays Jerome Facher, Beatrice's lawyer, as an old wise man who has seen everything and is impossible to ruffle. All he wants is to be left alone to eat his lunch in peace and he is content. William H. Macy plays Schlichtmann's firm's increasingly depressed accountant who is forced to leverage the partner's mortgages and take pile charges onto 20 credit cards in the seemingly hopeless effort to wait out the juggernauts their firm is up against. The DVD is itself very mediocre. It has a 5.1 Dolby Digital soundtrack, but because this isn't an action film, but more of a human/courtroom drama, there's really not a whole lot here to take advantage of 5.1 channels. The only "special feature" of this DVD is the so-called "Production Featurette" which must be all of 5 minutes long and amounts to more of a glorified trailer than anything else - basically it's just a rehash of scenes from the movie with a couple of really quick takes from Travolta and Macy about the movie. I hope that Touchstone will improve a bit on these featurettes in the future to where they actually contain some significant content.
Rating: 
Summary: Intelligent and Compelling Courtroom Drama
Review: Jan Schlichtmann (Travolta) is a Boston tort lawyer and something of an ambulance chaser who is initially reluctant to take on an industrial pollution case involving some children dead of leukaemia in rural New England. He changes his mind when he realizes the likely defendants are a couple of big companies with particularly deep pockets and smells the possibility of serious money. Over time, however his interest in the case becomes a moral obsession. The cynical becomes a crusader, refusing offers to settle as his company's finances spiral downwards towards bankruptcy. If you like courtroom dramas, this is highly recommended. It's one of the best specimens of the genre to come out of America since 'The Verdict'. It's interesting to compare it to 'Erin Brockovich' released a couple of years later. EB is about how a heroic small timer takes on the big boys of corporate America and how her pluck and determination triumphs over all obstacles, something of a legal feelgood movie in other words. Which this, to its great credit, is not. Its central character, for starters, is far more amibivalently likeable: initially just out for a fast buck, moral seriousness has to creep up on him and take him by surprise (perhaps reminding writer/director Zaillian of Oskar Schindler whose story he scripted for Spielberg a few years earlier) and the story's development paints a significantly more ambivalent picture of what pluck and determination can accomplish. It's a highpoint of Travolta's acting career even if he is comprehensively upstaged by Robert Duvall, on brilliant form as his quietly cynical adversary, bigshot lawyer Jerome Facher who knows far better than to look for the truth in a courtroom...
Rating:
Summary: Travolta is a good actor
Review: A Civil Action: Water. It's a basic fact we need it to survive. The human body can go longer without food than it can water. But what do you do when the water you need to survive may be killing your children? A small town in the North Eastern part of the United States faced this very problem in the 1970s. John Travolta plays Lawyer Jan Schlictmann in this movie based off a true story. Jan is the hottest young lawyer in Boston. He is a personal claims lawyer (some would call him an ambulance chaser of the highest degree) with a thriving small practice. He is one of the 10 most eligible bachelors in Boston. Jan will do anything to win a case. He has his own personal equation as to which person will bring in the most money from a trial and thus fill his pockets the deepest. The client he desperately wants to avoid is a dead child as they are worth the least in a jury verdict. Everything is going well for Jan and then a case with at least 10 dead children drops into his lap. This case is known as an "orphan" as it has landed in every prominent lawyer's office and all have passed on it prior to him. Jan meets with the families to give them a personal "No thank you." While there he finds of their suspicions as to chemicals that have been dumped into the ground and poisoned the water supply. What interests Jan the most is the parent companies behind the dumping. Suddenly a no interest case becomes one which could net him millions. The rest of the movie deals with Jan's obsessive involvement with this case. How it raises him to an almost unheard of prominence and dumps him into the lowest levels he has ever been. John Travolta does a good job in this role. He can play the ultimate of arrogance and also the most wounded of individuals as he grows to learn more about what life is truly about. William H. Macy is Jan's financial affairs person who is desperately trying to keep the firm afloat as Jan's obsession causes them to spend more and more. John Lithgow is fine as the Judge. Robert Duvall is great as the opposing lawyer who gives Jan a lesson in legal theatrics. The movie is well done but a little slow at times. Definitely would recommend it as the performances by all move this one.
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Summary: The book is SO MUCH BETTER
Review: The movie is fine... but the book is an amazing read. There is so much detail and nuance lost in the adaption to a visual medium.
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Summary: An Honest Hollywood Adaptation, For Once!
Review: No, this film is not "based on a true story" or the cringe-inducing "inspired by a true story" (the latter which can mean anything, and usually does)--the fact is, this film IS a true story. It is the true story of how a materialistic personal injury lawyer pursues a noble yet unwieldly case, at the cost of all the materialistic benefits that he had spent his entire career in creating for himself. Yes, this case really did exist. Yes, there really was (and still is) a lawyer named Jan Schlichtmann (as portrayed by Travolta), who really did pursue this case against two large corporations, Beatrice and W.R. Grace (both named in the movie), who really did illegally dump pollutants in a neighborhood somewhere in Massachusetts, and which really did cause the deaths of 12 children from leukemia. Yes, Mr. Schlichtmann really DID comment cynically when he was first presented with the case, "I really don't see the value in a bunch of dead babies." There really was a corporate defense attorney named Jerome Facher (as portrayed by Duvall) who played this case as if constantly hedging his bets at a Vegas casino poker table. And so on...you get the idea. This film is brutally honest, names names, pulls no punches...and forgoes the typical, traditional Hollywood-style happy ending for one that is completely real, unfabricated, and ultimately satisfying in the realization that, it too, is real. That doesn't mean that it is emotionally unsatisfying. After all, after investing nearly two hours with this case, and these characters, about which we grow to care completely (especially because we know they're real), this film does provide the payoff in the end. I just won't tell you which one; you have to see this brilliant film in order to find out. This film proves, for once and for all, that the truth really is stranger than fiction! MOST RECOMMENDED
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Summary: The Law stripped bare.
Review: "A Civil Action" is based on a true legal case; two corporations poisoned the water supply of a town in Massachusetts with carcinogens, for years, 'til they were finally taken to court in 1981, by the families of eight child leukemia victims, who sued them. I have to say up front that I have not, as yet, read the book, so I have no idea how faithful the screen adaptation is to the characters or events portrayed. Nor do I have any legal training, so I cannot argue procedural points and inaccuracies etc, so I will be reviewing the film for what it is, a film I enjoyed enormously in the cinema when it was first released, then bought on DVD. For me, "A Civil Action" is about the sins, and ultimate redemption, of an amoral, sleaze-bag, ambulance chasing, personal injury lawyer named Jan Schlichtmann, played to perfection by John Travolta. His sins are many, but chief amongst them are, greed - DUH, he's a LAWYER! - avarice, and the one that brings about his ultimate downfall, pride. We are introduced to the way Mr Schlichtmann operates in a blackly funny prologue. This shows said sleaze-bag lawyer pushing one of his wheelchair bound clients into court, arranging his pillows, getting him a drink, wiping away the resultant drips and drools. All the while jury members desperately try to choke back their tears, and the defending lawyers in the medical malpractice case equally desperately try to settle before the trial proper begins by writing increasingly large numbers on a pad for Schlichtmann to approve. While this is all going on Mr Schlichtmann gives a wonderfully deadpan voiceover, explaining how much you can expect to receive for various types of injury; loss of limb, blindness, death etc. Next we see our hero striding purposefully down the street, passing a traffic accident, handing his card to both parties, and moving on without hardly breaking step! But the film is not a one-man-show. It has an excellent core cast comprising Tony Shalhoub and William H Macey as Schlichtmann's partners, Kathleen Quinlan and a pre "Sopranos" James Gandolfini as grieving parents. Dan Hedaya as the owner of the plant at the center of the story, John Lithgow as the trial judge, and last, but definitely NOT least, Robert Duval, the main defending lawyer, and Schlichtmann's nemesis, Jerome Facher. After the opening prologue, we see that Schlichtmann's practice has inherited the "poisoning" case, but can do nothing with it because they can't find anyone to sue! Schlichtmann decides that he will personally visit the defendants and tell them that - sorry! - there's nothing to be done. While there he discovers that there is indeed someone to sue, the land and plant are owned by two of America's major corporations... these people, and his practice, are sitting on, as he describes it, "a gold mine!" The case continues, overwhelming evidence is gathered, Schlichtmann and his team talk about hundreds of millions of $'s in compensation for the aggrieved families of Woburn, Massachusetts... with a healthy percentage going to the practice itself of course! Unfortunately Schlichtmann's fatal weakness is his pride; the defendants are willing to settle out of court, but Schlichtmann is determined to take the case to trial and get the families, not only their money, but also an apology from all those concerned. There is a beautiful scene where Facher and Schlichtmann are out in a corridor awaiting a jury's decision. Facher asks Schlichtmann what he hopes will happen, Schlichtmann replies that he hopes the jury will see the "truth," after sitting through the endless procedural BS'ing and maneuvering that has made up the case. Facher is aghast, and tells Schlichtmann that he should know that, "...a courtroom isn't a place to look for the truth." This certainly supports my own rather cynical view that there is "Justice," and there is the "Law." Unfortunately, they are rarely one and the same. The blurb on the jacket claims that "A Civil Action" is, "The best legal thriller ever." I personally believe this quote does the film a major disservice; by calling it a "thriller" it gives the audience the idea that this is going to be something formulaic and Hollywood, with the requisite "Hollywood" ending, it's not. It's based on true events and shows the legal system here in the USA stripped bare, it shows the impartial brutality of the adversarial system, and how one mans flaws can be amplified by that system, 'til they consume not only him, but all those around him. I think this is an excellent film, as are the performances of all concerned. But be warned, this is NOT a "feel good" movie, unlike "Erin Brockovich," with which it shares many surface similarities, and it is this that probably explains why it pretty much bombed here in the US, but was a big hit in the UK. There is a bitter-sweet ending, given to us in a coda which shows the ultimate price Mr Schlichtmann paid for his involvement in the case, and what he is doing now. And yes, for those of us out there who ever doubted it, "A Civil Action," the film credited with re-launching ol' swivel hips' career, proves, once and for all, that John Travolta CAN act!
Rating:
Summary: A Civil Travolta
Review: This is a really good film that didn't get near the attention it should have. A great story, a terrific premise and plot. And Travolta nails his performance as a man faced with the dilemna of doing the "right thing" at great personal expense, or walking away with what he has left. This is a morality play of sorts and Travolta is the conscience of us all. We're thrilled when he triumphs; we breathe a sigh of relief and unclench our fists. Yet, we probably wouldn't have blamed him if he had walked. A nice film.
Rating:
Summary: Underrated
Review: 'A Civil Action' is one of the most underrated movies of the past 5 years. Pay very close attention to the very first scene of the movie and the very last scene of the movie. THE POINT will come to you. :)
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Summary: More Powerful When You See the Area of the Movie
Review: Having always been a John Travolta fan, I knew I would like this movie regardless of its topic. However, just recently I had the opportunity to visit family who live directly across the street from one of the corporate buildings of the polluters and it made it all come to life for me. I could envision those children being poisoned silently and the families not getting the kind of response they needed from the government, let alone someone to listen to them about the seriousness of the problem. And to say it was a "minor" problem in history makes me wonder why the property nearby is a DEQ Superfund cleanup spot. Too bad there aren't more being like Jan S. in our world today.
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