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ERIN BROCKOVICH Send This Review to a Friend
I refuse to join those who may think that someone principled who crusades for a cause can't also be beautiful. Casting Julia Roberts in the title role of "Erin Brockovich," a rousing story about suing a giant corporation that is ruining people's lives with pollution, doesn't taint the film with Hollywood gloss. As a matter of fact, the real-life Ms. Brockovich, who was a heroine in the true saga on which the film is based, is something of a looker herself. Roberts comes to the part after a career involving of lots of fluff. But if one had never seen her before, the verdict would justly be that, cover girl looks aside, a terrific new actress had been discovered.
It is not a sin to make a big popular film out of a worthy cause. With Stephen Soderbergh's no-nonsense direction and Roberts as his dramatically impressive star, "Erin Brockovich" is likely to reach a vast audience, and that's all to the good. Susannah Grant's smooth script that provides strong characterizations, the right sort of humor in the right places and poignant scenes without being cloying establishes the solid groundwork.
Roberts, a knockout in clinging clothes and high heels, plays a twice-divorced single mother of three, who is struggling to meet her bills. She has a nasty temper and an attitude that can alienate anyone who might do her some good. They mask her insecurities stemming from lack of higher education and focused training, as well as her despair for the way her life has turned out thus far. But she has basic intelligence, guts and a human touch with people who need help, and is a fast learner. Thus when she bulldozes her way into a job at the legal firm of Ed Marsy, played by Albert Finney, who has failed in winning an auto accident case for her, she may alienate him and the women in the office, but her personality and smarts are what turn out to help set in motion a whale of a legal case against the power plant in California that has wreaked havoc with the water system. That she has no legal training doesn't matter. She's a feisty assistant who grasps what has to be done, for a cause and for herself.
Finney, who has always been a good actor, gets even better with age. He brilliantly makes the most of a meaty role, the lawyer who alternately resists and succumbs to the fierce determination of Brockovich to do right by the contamination victims and expand their case to its just proportions. Either way, he projects an impression of a wise, experienced but overwhelmed lawyer in over his head but spurred on by Brockovich's prodding. You can't call him a picture-stealer because Roberts is so good, but he's another memorable force that accounts for much of what works so well.
Brockovich's personal life and relationship with her children are handled with feeling minus the sugar, as is the relationship she forms with George, a biker who has moved next door and insinuates himself into her life by sitting for the children. The emotional involvement to which this leads seems natural, as does his resentment of her time spent working, and the relationship is also used as a springboard for Brockovich's self-assertion and vow that she is through living her life according to the needs of a man. The script covers such matters expeditiously and Aaron Eckhart is sympathetic and convincing in his portrait of George. The film is also enriched by excellent supporting performances.
"Erin Brockovich" is a movie that has something to say, does so entertainingly and elevates Julia Roberts to recognition for dramatic skills that she has not yet had this much of a chance to reveal. A Universal Pictures and Columbia Pictures release.
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