The One Where The Adjustment Bureau Clears Matt Damon Of All Wrong Doing In Hereafter!
What if you lost your phone? Or, you lost the numbers on your phone? It’s a pain in the ass, right? But what if it wasn’t just something that happened? What if “Angels” (bare with me) did it. Either by stealing the phone. Or clicking their fingers to delete the numbers? What if they were following “The Plan”, set by The Chairman (God?)?
Well, much to my surprise, The Adjustment Bureau asks these questions. And the reason for those bizarre posters of Matt Damon running, (you know, like Jason Bourne), become clear. How the hell do you get that opening paragraph onto a poster? Or a trailer?
I have to say, the first time I saw the trailer for this, I knew I would love it. The connection between Emily Blunt and Damon struck a chord. They seemed to nail it, (not like that), more in that trailer than in hundreds of other films combined. The relationship looked real. Blunt was English. Damon is just likeable, and funny. I’m really pleased to say that fizz between them is transferred into the film. That is critical, too. The whole film hinges on you wanting these two together. Come the end, where we vere dangerously close to Vanilla Sky territory (loved that film), you have to want them to get together. If you don’t, well, what happens next is going to feel like the biggest kick in the balls ever.
There is no action in this film. Lets get that out of the way, now. This is not Bourne 4. So how do you keep an audience engrossed?
Well, for me, the Director makes a couple of decisions early on that demand respect.
For a start, the credits are simple. Just the title. No MATT DAMON STARS IN emphasis. This isn’t about Matt Damon. (But seriously, is there a better, more consistent Actor around?).
We then, we get five minutes of Matt Damon. We learn he is a bit of a Maverick. He is running for Senate, and we learn how his age goes against him, and how, although popular and able to lead the free world someday, he keeps blowing it.
It’s a brave move. Already people seemed to be looking at each other, as if to say… “Dude… WTF… Why isn’t he running?” in a Beavis and Butthead voice.
Damon meets Blunt in the mens room (long story… but no so much by “chance”, as it being what The Chairman (GOD??) wants/needs.
Then, the kick. (There are a ton of similarities with Inception, by the way. Bring a comparison on, I love how this has come in under the radar. For me, it’s idea is just as clever, and far less fancy).
The kick? A little subtitle that Beavis and Butthead probably missed. Three Years Later. Really? Really?? I couldn’t believe it. What a brilliant way of making everything mean something. Of upping the stakes. You mean, a Hollywood film is telling me they didn’t live happily ever after? That three years later, Damon and Blunt have never seen each other since their chance meeting? Love. It.
Where the story goes after that will have you enthralled or in disbelief they are trying to tell you this whole premise… this Plan, hinges on the way you turn a door knob. Or the hat you wear.
I’ll tell you one thing, as I drove Home to see Mrs T and ET (not that one), all of the lights were green.
You don’t think…..? No. After the day I had just had, it was fate.
