Outwit. Outspy. Outsmart. Outplay. Then get out.
Duplicity
By Daryl Tan
Director: Tony Gilroy
Starring: Clive Owen, Julia Roberts, Paul Giamatti, Tom Wilkinson, Rick Worthy, Dennis O'Hare
Official website: http://www.duplicitymovie.net/
If you wanted to make a movie about covert agents, exotic romances and corporate sharking, but couldn't decide on which would be the better flick to pursue, what would you do? It seems that in Duplicity, director Tony Gilroy decided spraying a little of each in the mix would make for a great broth. The results don't suggest so.
Clive Owen (Ray Koval) and Julia Roberts (Claire Stenwick) play a romantically-entwined couple whose love affair began in the summer of a quaint Roman town. Now, five years on, they are corporate spies working against each other for warring pharmaceutical firms. This disjointed narrative tracks their escapades as Claire attempts to prevent Ray from stealing a top secret document which could prove to be a potentially hair-raising breakthrough in medical science.
Then again, with Tony Gilroy at the helm, things can never be that simple. After all, the man did write the screenplays for the Bourne trilogy, and he manages to pull a rabbit out of the hat again this time, making for a wicked punchline at the film's end.
Still, I was disappointed with Duplicity. Watching the film pan out, I couldn't help thinking this was a romantic drama masquerading as a spy thriller, and it ended up accomplishing the function of neither. The movie was poorly paced and structured, which I would attribute to an over-indulgence in witty repartee between Ray and Claire.
The dialogue in Duplicity seems to have taken its cue from 1994 cult hit Pulp Fiction. It tries to be smart, slick, and teeming with innuendos and furtiveness. While Pulp Fiction introduced a new kind of cool for its time, laced with tenaciously subtle humor, Duplicity struggles to seduce with charming conversation. There are some true gems in the verbal jousts, such as when Ray tells Claire "I'm not great on names. Where I'm solid? People I've slept with." Anything else just doesn't amount to much, and it slows the action down to a snail's pace.
Paul Giamatti was the one stand-out spark who enlivened the film every time it threatened to sink into dullsville. Clive Owen's attempt to be both Sean Connery and Harrison Ford at the same time wasn't too impressive. Perhaps it's the want of screen presence. That said, Owen did pull off the contained intensity of the Ray character well enough, and young ladies in the audience will be happy to savor this eye-candy.
The screen pairing of Owen and Julia Roberts smolders like it should between two stoic characters. Roberts carries her role with a quiet conviction, although I'd have preferred the Claire character to have exuded a more exotic, tropical quality.
To his credit, Tony Gilroy, who wrote and directed Duplicity, had an enthralling screenplay on his hands, choked with intriguing characters and an intelligent storyline. This film would be deserving of a better rating based on the strength of the plot alone. As for the moral of the story? Don't underestimate mousey older women. They might just prove to be smarter than you think. You'll see.
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