Review: The Adjustment Bureau

Here's one of those films that never floors you. It has no big "wow" moments. It lacks sex and violence and spectacle. And its finale is ridiculously (and ironically) predictable.

And yet its a highly entertaining film.

Because the desperation of the characters, which is at the core of the story, is a gradual thing that becomes more and more intense and even believable without being over the top. And the "wow" moments are little instead of big, and I would argue more effective, for having more to do with the romantic chemistry of the leads. And the film is sexy instead of visually explicit; its violence is rare and purposeful; and the spectacle is in the scope of the ideas being played out and discussed on screen. The end of the film? While predictable, offers a payoff the audience (most of the audience?) yearns for.

I seem to admire Matt Damon more and more. Even when he's running the hell out of the camerawork here, there's not a hint of Jason Bourne. He's really great in this movie and I believe every aspect of his character, flaws and all. And Emily Blunt just continues to arouse me on so many levels. She too is fantastic and constructs such a perfect chemistry with Damon that you'd imagine it could not have happened with any other actor. Together they make this movie what it is -- a romance. One of the best I've seen in a while. A romance laced with just enough sci-fi, action, and mystery, to make you forget you're watching a romance. Until the greatest moments of the film hit you over the head, which are really nothing more than Damon and Blunt expressing their love for one another.

Sure, there are a few nagging elements that keep me from absolutely loving The Adjustment Bureau (I found Roger Sterling distracting, and I sometimes found myself suddenly not listening to the dialogue of a new scene for want of piecing together the short expository scene that preceded it, and I think I would have liked just a bit "more" of an ending, etc.), but I'm still recommending it highly (the senate run montage near the beginning of the film, as well as Terence Stamp as the bureau's "hammer" are such first-rate bonuses that I have to mention them).

Basically, it's a pretty great thing to want to embrace romance where and when you weren't expecting to find it. I doubt it was Philip K. Dick's intention to pull on our heartstrings, but the adaptation here works.

Let's just call it insightful and get back to the snogging, shall we?