ARTS

Civil Action strays from courtroom norm

by Dan Roisman

The not-so-fine "art of the court-room drama" seems to be the only encounter with legal practice one might ever expect to find in the popular media. Frankly, court-room dramas have been done and redone ad nauseam since Inherit the Wind and To Kill a Mocking Bird. Quite a relief is to be had from A Civil Action, appearing at the Apollo Friday.

The irritating thing about the predominance of court-room dramas is that such a vast majority of legal action takes place outside the court. Is being a lawyer so dull that nothing worth writing about occurs in depositions or just in an office? Well, as it turns out, lawyering is pretty thin on cathartic experience outside the courtroom. Even in the courtroom, there usually isn't much to speak of. Fortunately, A Civil Action has some strong assets that save the story from itself.

For starters, the actors are superb. John Travolta is, well, John Travolta; take him or leave him, and most prefer to take him. Robert Duvall is decidedly Robert Duvall, and at this point, after seeing his huge past successes, only idiots don't choose to take him. No disappointment is to be found here. Duvall excels as always: note the Oscar nomination. And as usual William H. Macy also turned out a fine performance.

What really makes these actors' performances great is not just their own individual ability, but rather the tremendous synergy they ignite on-screen. They are able to take some relatively trivial plots and characters and make them move.

They don't do it alone though. The director, Steve Zaillian, better known for his talent as a writer than as a director, does a fine job of maintaining the momentum of the story. Quite a feat indeed, considering the plot seems a little short on mass.

Zaillian's only other directing of note is in Searching for Bobby Fischer, a film wrought with cheese and dramatic bludgeoning. While Zaillian hasn't completely shed his propensity for an easy tear-jerker of a scene, he does manage to create some fantastic power-struggles in this movie that is all about some of the most subtle uses of power in our society.

And, heck, with a cast like this one, who could lose?

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Copyright © 1999, The Oberlin Review.
Volume 127, Number 16, March 5, 1999

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