The Lincoln Lawyer (2011)

The good: This old-school courtroom thriller has good casting and acting, and features a fast-moving plot that keeps you on your toes. It also features Marisa Tomei who is as lovely as always.The screenplay, however, is one of those times when the writers try too hard to be clever beyond their grasp of the plot, and end up shooting themselves in the foot and contradicting themselves..*spoilers*The biggest problem is with Roulet's plan. At first he lies so well that he even has McConaughey believing him. And since he is a well known talented lawyer, and now he has him on his side, that should be enough to win. In fact, he could have hired any lawyer with his money and convinced him the same way. Except for some reason this isn't enough and it suddenly turns out that he asked for McConaughey because it would conflict with a previous case where he put an innocent man in jail.So what is the plan exactly? To have McConaughey afraid of revealing his mistake in public? Nothing would have happened! Everyone made the same mistake including the judge. In fact, he may just be the type of person who would want very much to correct this mistake, thus choosing him as his lawyer as part of his strategy makes no sense.In addition, if he hadn't hired him, nobody would have made the connection between the two murders in the first place.And then he goes and kills McConaughey's friend and sets him up for blackmail. Besides this being already two plans too many, once again, why not blackmail any other lawyer that wouldn't have been able to connect the cases in the first place? And to really finish himself off, he made it personal by killing McConaughey's friend when he could have framed any old murder in the same way. Would you hire a lawyer to defend you from the death penalty after killing his friend? Obviously he can do any of 500 things to sabotage the case, which is exactly what he did.And then they just couldn't resist adding a completely random twist where the murderer turns out to be someone else for no particular reason, thus undermining plausibility just to keep the twists coming.There are more plot holes, but this is quite enough for now.So, again, a case of hacks trying to be clever and biting off way more than they can chew.

Lots of good acting and directing and dialogue. But to many gaping plot holes.1, he says he got hit on the head and knocked out. but the two men who helped the victim would have testified he was not. that one alone would have found him guilty without a doubt as I'm sure they would have also testified to witnessing the bad guy beating the victim. 2, the other guy in jail for the similar crime would have also testified that this new bad guy was his bad guy too. instant get of of jail free card. but he doesn't use it, instead he freaks out and runs away. total garbage. the script writer was an idiot for using that and everyone letting that stay in the movie is an idiot too. 3, the gun was stolen from the lawyers office, not his home. maybe his home doesn't have cameras, maybe it does. but the office would have and it would have also been easy enough to find on the cameras when the bad guy came into the building on his own when the gun was stolen. also, no reason to believe the bad guy knew any gun was there. made worse when the lawyer doesn't tell the police his gun is stolen. (and yes, that gun could have been linked to him by the old bullets tracing, not the shells, if any bullets have been kept also as it was used in evidence previously as claimed it was still) 4, hard to believe anyone, lawyers included, especially this lawyer, wouldn't have made sure the damaging evidence against his confessed guilty client had made it into the hands of the right people while keeping his hands clean of it. especially after the bad guy made this extra personal by killing his friend. those 4 points brought this otherwise unexceptional typical courtroom drama down from a probably 6.5 or 7 to a 1.to many times movies mistakes are missed or ignored because of all the nice flashy good stuff in between. but if you don't pay attention, you are only fooling yourself. Hollywood, like anyone else, needs to be as accurate as possible to be responsible to the audience. i personally hate it when they mess up history. if censorship should be anywhere, it should be when history is twisted for the sake of being creative.

This film is a very entertaining, if a little dumbed-down/simplified story. It is not easy to make a completely original courtroom drama, considering that this is not really a new genre and considering that there are shows like Law and Order (the original) that were releasing 21+ episodes of courtroom drama a year.There are original legal dramas, it is not impossible, but you need more time than a film. Suits, The Night Of and some others take their time to tell a long story. In a film of 2 hours, it's much harder.Having that said, they did a great job here. The production values are high. The script is tight, without pointless subplots and missing plot threads. It never feels too long nor rushed. The music does its part, the cinematography is very good, keeps things fresh and interesting. The one flaw I would say this film has is that there isn't much of a twist. Let me explain. It's not predictable to the point where you're guessing and taking bets on what happens next, but a lot of that is due to them telling you exactly what's what. The mystery part is unexplored, so we don't have that suspense. We don't get a chance to think or try to solve the puzzle, we just get to watch the story unravel like a magic trick.This is good film nonetheless and if Hollywood made more films like this, not necessarily 10/10 films week in week out (which is impossible, unless you're a very generous reviewer) then I'd say we are in a kind of golden age of cinema.Unfortunately, the average film these days is a 4/10 or 5/10 cashgrab, as sequels, requels make these original 7/10 films as rare as 9/10s and 10/10s.

I wish I had seen this film back in 2011, so that I could herald the dawn of McConaughey's prime like so many of the critics did. Because this is the film that did it for him, and I'm thrilled to see it was a strong start for him.The Lincoln Lawyer is a magnificent moral film, with enough mindgames, suspense and deceit to more than make up for its unremarkable court room scenes. John Romano's screenplay is full of depth and unfolds so beautifully that I couldn't fault a single turn. Brad Furman's direction is very skilled - the last twenty minutes of the film are flawless and so full of tension I was on the edge of my seat. The whole film looks beautiful, with gorgeous cinematography and production design all around.There's nothing to say about McConaughey other than this was a remarkable turn for him (digging his A Time to Kill drama-legal chops out from under his piles of romcom money). The rest of the cast is also excellent - though the film wastes Bryan Cranston - featuring gorgeous performances from Ryan Phillipe, Marisa Tomei, William H. Macey and Michael Pena. Michael Pena confirms his status as one of the most underrated actors in the profession with just a two scene turn as a man who pleaded guilty to a crime just to avoid the death penalty, despite professing his innocence. The way in which Furman juxtaposed Martinez's first scene, where he's almost howling in fear whilst a cool Haller tries to stay detached, with the second, where a shaved and icy Martinez deflects a noticeably upset Haller's attempts to finally hear his story, is truly masterful. Tomei and McConaghey have great chemistry - to the extent that their divorce stops being believable at times, but the script puts just enough conflict there to stop it being an afterthought.I have to dedicate time just to talk about Ryan Philippe in particular. Whatever he is up to in the script he plays convincingly. A wrongly accused rich kid? A desperate son? Or perhaps a cold-blooded serial killer hiding behind the mask of his polite plea for freedom. Phillipe plays them all with incredible conviction, but there is such fluidity to his performance that it doesn't feel clunky or forced. He began to scare me simply by his appearance on the screen. An incredible, Oscar-worthy performance by Phillipe, which makes me sad that this film never got the attentions of the Academy. I can guarantee that there were a few films that year that could have sat out in categories for this film. Alexander Payne could've sat out for Furman, and Max von Sydow for Phillipe. The Ides of March could've missed out for the screenplay here. The Lincoln Lawyer is technically a legal drama, but the courtroom is just a place for this suspenseful, well-acted moral play to unfold. Its the left bookend for a long McConassance, and that should be reason enough to see it.