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The Adjustment Bureau is marketed as a psychological thriller in the vein of Inception. But while Inception made a hash out of the first chapter of a 100 level psych textbook, The Adjustment Bureau does the same with novels from the Harlequin back catelogue. It was adapted from a short story by the mediocre Philip K. Dick, whose estate continues to profit off sub-literate studio executives. Check out his story We Can Remember It For You Wholesale sometime. If you think Arnold's acting is wooden, wait til you cop this rich stiff's prose. Matt Damon plays a young aspiring senator whose job never gets in the way of muff-chasing. Routed in the election when the tabloid press runs some risque photos from his frat days, he does the meet-cute with a pale ballet pixie played by Emily Blunt. Damon's boner is sustained through a speech that supposedly resurrects his political career. They meet again through happenstance a while later, inadvertently leading Damon into the mysterious world of the eponymous group of fedora-wearing bureaucrats with magical powers. They "adjust" events to correspond to the plan of a deus ex machina device called the Chairman. What follows is a suspenseless, walking-speed thriller where Damon evades ashen-faced agents and defies fate itself for some high-class English 'tang. It's a cheese-clogged assload meant to emblemize the timeless and time-consuming debate of free will versus predestination. Director/screenwriter George Nolfi has aspirations of poignancy and depth, but needs a few more credit hours in the community college creative writing program. Most of the characters are fluent in exposition. There are approximately 8,000 over-the-shoulder scenes of bland prophecies of doom, usually at some well-known NYC landmark. The humourless agents keep telling Damon that if he tempts fate, they'll give him the equivalent of a lobotomy. Yet, for all their power, they can never seem to get a beat on him. This is explained away in repeated, tedious scenes where the agents watch a book with a magical CGI flow chart. I kept thinking they ought to tie him down and administer a chemical castration, but I guess God doesn't do that heavy-handed bible poo poo anymore. Damon and Blunt have suprising chemistry early on in the movie, but each are summarily administered the chloroform-soaked rag of the plot. And as the movie progressed, I was forced to ask, who gives a poo poo? I wouldn't have minded the sneaky marketing of what is essentially a date movie if they'd given me a reason to care. But this thing keeps piling on the plot holes, dead ends and inconsistencies until you're left a quivering ball of atheist anomie, alone in a godless universe. The Adjustment Bureau specializes in the sort of empty-headed, quasi-philosophical nonsense I'd expect at a museum of creationism, not a loving movie theatre. Let's just say Pascal wouldn't wager on this. Avoid it like a free e-meter reading.
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Mar 6, 2011 23:42
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This movie does not match its trailer whatsoever. If you were hoping for an intense and mysterious film about a shady organization that controls people's fates, skip it. The Adjustment Bureau are basically comic relief, and the entire dilemma of the film is solved literally by a magic hat. The only strong parts at all were Blunt's and Damon's interactions, which, if transplanted to a proper drama about real life circumstances preventing them from being together, may have been a stronger film by far. 2/5
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Mar 7, 2011 01:03
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I thought it was alright. A bit silly, especially towards the end, but switch your brain off and you'll have fun. Would also be a good date movie, I think. 3.5/5
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Mar 19, 2011 21:48
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