Manipulations

The genre of the movie is described as a drama/thriller. In fact, the only thrilling thing about it would be having to decide what's more dubious here – the writing or directing. Or what's less interesting about the lead – his face or his acting. The only remotely redeeming quality of this movie in terms of its performances is the participation of those two gentlemen you can see on the poster in the background. They at least somewhat deliver – a minor feat given the material that they're given. So, obviously, the material itself has none. And the only real mystery you may need to unravel is why three men responsible for a handful of mediocre horrors conspired this time to produce a horribly mediocre thriller which literally contains nothing. If you want a comparatively decent drama involving corrupt corporations and providing some social commentary - watch "The Constant Gardener". If you want a stylish "corporate thriller" subterraneanly reflecting upon human nature - watch "Demonlover". This one is hardly any good for anything. However, there is still something really dramatic about it – it's realizing that this kind of stuff is all Hollywood has to offer to the great ones like Pacino today.

Somebody mentioned the emotionless acting, and even if I can second that to some degree, there was a requirement for some of them to display that psychotic trait so the movie would make sense, and therefore a strange thing to comment on in my opinion. I wouldn't bash on the acting so much as maybe the screenplay. The movie is built up as a true thriller should, to leave clues along the way until the last final scene which then will uncover the truth. It got a little too scrambled up, to try to follow the timeline, but I still enjoyed the dark feeling to the movie. Although I'm still not quite sure I understood what really happen I think I will give it another look to pick up clues I didn't get the first time. I think there's something to be told here, I'm just not sure the director got the message clear.

The plot is twisting, twisting and twisting again, while characters that seem to be one thing are revealed to be another, interacting in all kinds of ways. However, in order for a story to be successful, the plot needs to be interesting and the characters well defined before you do the plot twisting. Bottom line: a lot atwist about nothing. Now there's some Shakespeare for you.

Yet somehow things are getting worse and worse: known actors have puny or plain bad roles, the acting is mediocre at best, the editing of the scenes, vague and not linear in time, confuses the hell out of the viewer. The girls: Julia Stiles, Malin Akerman, Alice Eve - they do the best with their roles, in fact they are the best actors in this film, far outclassing old farts like Pacino and Hopkins, who's only purpose in life nowadays is to give megalomaniacal speeches.

A special mention for Alice Eve. She did a weird kind of interpretation which was awesome. I don't know if it was her idea or the director's, but her character gave me the creeps. It just wasn't completely right for this movie.

Conclusion: a waste of time and talent. A confusing story that feels like someone's ego trip, a boring film, a pointless story.

I didn't liked this movie. The acting seemed to me unnatural, all of the actors were over-calm an emotionless, it was like a film for androids, at least in most of it. The plot had a potential but it was unrealized for a lot of reasons, I think mostly the directing. As the action was moving towards the end the whole thing became even more messy and sporadic and it all ended with a grand finale of nonsense.

Sorry about my poor English but I felt obliged to prevent other people from seeing that movie. I'm a simple man and I don't know much about the art cinematography but I can distinguish a bad movie when I see it, believe me.

"New events have come to light that change the nature of this allegation." Arthur Denning (Hopkins) is a pharmaceutical executive that is being sued for negligence, and to top it off his girlfriend has disappeared. Ben Cahill (Duhamel) is an up and coming lawyer that is assigned to the case. When Ben becomes personally involved with what is happening lives and careers are in jeopardy. I was very excited about this movie. Al Pacino and Anthony Hopkins together seems like a dream paring and I was looking forward to seeing those two together. Little by little my hopes were vanishing and by the time they were on screen together it was so anti-climatic that I didn't even care. Pacino and Hopkins were on screen total for about 15 min, not together. The movie is told through present day and flashbacks, but I didn't realize that until almost the end. The movie is decent but because of my high expectations involving the first paring of Pacino and Hopkins I was severely disappointing. Overall, this for me was just too disappointing for me to have enjoyed like I could have if it was two lesser actors. I give this a very disappointing and frustrating C.