Review: Match Point

I love movies, even those arty indie movies that you have to go to special theaters to see. Yet, I have seen fairly few Woody Allen movies over the course of my life. Both of his movies that I have seen I enjoyed, but still I have some reticence to see his films. Nonetheless, this weekend my wife and I ventured to one of the local megaplexes to see Woody Allen's most recent effort Match Point. Going in to see this movie I knew a few things:

1. Scarlett Johansson is in the film so it'll either be really arty or terrible (or both)
2. The plot involved infidelity between a man and his future sister-in-law
   
3. Someone gets killed.

Okay, so this could be Fatal Attraction with a Woody Allen twist, which means there's a distinct possibility that this is a wretched movie. With all this in mind we headed off...

Match Point is a slow movie, which as I understand is a characteristic of all Allen movies. The first 3/4 of the movie is really slow, but still interesting. It seems that Allen manages to get a ton of stuff into each scene, so while the scene is really slow it's terribly interesting. The last half-hour of the movie goes really fast and it's intriguing. Allen puts in twists that don't make any sense until the very end of the movie - in fact he seems to have put in twists just to confuse the audience and then has to figure a way out of the twist -- all this makes the movie more interesting.

The basic synopsis of the film is that Chris Wilton, an Irish former tennis pro (played by Jonathan Rhys-Meyers) has just married Chloe Hewett (played by the amazing Emily Mortimer), the daughter of a rich British businessman. Chloe's brother is dating a down and out American actress named Nola (played by Johansson). While Chris loves Chloe - and the life provided by being a member of the Hewett family - he is obsessed with Nola. It is this obsession with Nola and the tension he feels about losing the life he has gained by being in the Hewett family - including Chloe - that leads to the action of the film.

The casting of this film is almost as important as the writing and directing of the film. All of the main actors do a terrific job. Johansson does a competent job, but as always I'm not totally sold on her performance -- it always seems like she is bored with her roles. Rhys-Meyers and Mortimer on the other hand do a terrific job. Rhys-Meyers is an up and coming Irish actor best known by me as the soccer coach in Bend it like Beckham. His performance is compelling - as my wife said he's so nice that it's hard to hate him over the course of the movie. I was very pleasantly surprised to see Emily Mortimer in this movie. She doesn't make many appearances in American movies which is why she is suffering from Jennifer Connelly syndrome - great actress in supporting parts that never gets mentioned at awards time. (Yes, I know Connelly has won an Oscar so she is no longer suffering from the syndrome). While Mortimer's role in this film is strictly supporting, she does a terrific job supporting the film.

With all this said, it should be obvious that I really liked this movie. In the end it is a kind of Fatal Attraction movie, but it is worth the time to find out why and how. It is an artistic movie - e.g. no explosions - so if you're in the mood for a pop-corn flick go see Underworld: Evolution. But if you're in the mood for a serious movie with great writing, directing and acting then this would be the movie to go see. Heck, I may even see more Woody Allen films because of this.......or maybe not.