A CIVIL ACTION (56)

Directed by: Steven Zaillian

Starring: John Travolta, Robert Duvall, William H. Macy, Kathleen Quinlan

The Pitch: The true story of personal-injury lawyer Jan Schlichtmann's legal battle against two major corporations for causing several deaths by leukemia in a small New England town.

Theo Sez: Almost superb - but something is missing, and in the end it barely works at all. Zaillian has a feel for crude-but-irresistible dramatic devices - from the scribbled Post-Its of the opening sequence to our hero's twiddled pen suddenly still as a witness gives an unexpected answer in a deposition - and many individual scenes are so perfectly achieved you just want to cheer, but what's missing is the motivation : it's the story of a man who wilfully destroys himself, and we never find out why (at one point he's actually asked why he's doing it, and has no answer). The real problem, though, isn't the vacuum but the film's confusion on how to fill it : after all, the impressive (if over-rated) book did find an implicit explanation for Jan's behaviour, based on the maxim (as the voice-over informs us) that "lawsuits are War" - it's a story of obsession, stoked by the System's emphasis on winning, righteous (and much-rewarded) aggression spiralling out of control. Zaillian, however, wants a 'sexier' motive, wants to jerk some tears, making his hero a callous, calculating pro ("I can appreciate the theatrical value of several dead kids") who gets compassion as a result of the case - a hokey strategy, unconvincing in itself and vitiated both by Travolta's inexpressive performance and by the fact that the pivotal car-trip-with-dying-kid monologue calls up unfortunate (and unflattering) echoes of THE SWEET HEREAFTER ; worst of all, the film seems to realise it's getting nowhere, and starts to add other explanations halfway through - pride, paranoia, the cosiness of the legal Establishment, a judicial process that's incompatible with Truth. The result is well-meant, intelligent and a damp squib, a muddy, over-reaching movie that never ignites ; some good turns from a spectacular supporting cast, though (special props to James Gandolfini and an unshaven Dan Hedaya), and Duvall turns in a fascinating performance, a pared-down man who's subsumed everything to 'the game' and gets a kick out of covering up his aggression with little eccentricities (but it's there, even when he bites into a doughnut). The film disapproves of his unsentimental certitude ; it should perhaps have learned from it.