State of Play

Got a mad-on at those faceless financial conspirators -- self-styled "masters of the universe" -- who've ankled with millions after wiping out your 401(K)? Then you'll get a kick out of "State of Play," a fun, if not fresh, thriller about amoral politicians and corporate sharks competing to rule your world. Just don't go in expecting a paranoid masterpiece on the order of Alan Pakula's "The Parallax View" or Michael Mann's "The Insider." "Play" gains traction as engaging B-level entertainment from movie-star power, happily proof against Kevin ("The Last King of Scotland") Macdonald's clunky direction.

The movie's hot-button plot elements -- adultery, murder, congressional chicanery, a metastasizing Blackwater-style corporation -- riveted viewers back in 2003 as a BBC miniseries. Who better to script the remake than Tony Gilroy, go-to guy for narratives thrumming with high-octane plotlines, semi-sharp dialogue, pervasive paranoia and double dealing? Gilroy wrote and directed "Michael Clayton" and the recent "Duplicity," both of which encouraged us to bite into the tasty villainies of Big Business.

At first sight, "Play" promises a top-notch roller-coaster ride. We're plunged into rain-slicked streets clogged with D.C. traffic and anonymous pedestrians, ominous growls of thunder signaling trouble to come. Then a dark figure slams into some elderly strollers, flings its way headlong in front of and over a car, and continues to flee hell for leather until finding cover, hunkering down behind garbage cans in an alley. Who is he? Is he safe? Safe from what?

You'd have to be a stone not to be hooked by the jolt of action, the desperate flight through noirish weather, the opening gambit in a paranoid puzzle. Trouble is, that forward momentum stalls, stuck in an implausible mystery that riddles us by fits and starts, undercutting full-fledged suspense.

Cal McAffrey (Russell Crowe), ace Washington Globe reporter, takes a walk down that dangerous alley to unravel the first thread in a complex web of corruption and conspiracy. Caught in that sticky web is McAffrey's lifelong friend Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck), fair-haired boy in the House of Representatives. Only old-school investigative reporting -- of the newsprint variety -- can save the young legislator and expose the sordid state of play among elite and bottom-feeding gamers in the nation's capital.

Seems Collins has been cheating on his sleek Vanity Fair wife (Robin Wright Penn) with a congressional aide. Not too smart, since he's chairing hearings on a ruthless corporation selling privatized military power (like the one giving Jack Bauer grief this season on "24"). When Collins' lover apparently suicides, the smear kicks in. McAffrey, suspecting corporate skullduggery, puts his investigative skills to work to save his pal.

Affleck deploys -- with relish -- his Dudley Do-Right good looks, the kind of cartoonish probity that buys votes and sells tickets. In your gut, you know this John Edwards clone is too good to be true-blue, but we -- along with his friend and betrayed wife -- keep coming back for more.

First and foremost, it's juicy acting that animates this "Play." Crowe just eats the movie up, his bad-boy charisma claiming stage center, forcing even ace players like Viola Davis and Jason Bateman to become spectators. When Crowe and his editor (Helen Mirren) cross swords in her glass-walled office, the whole pressroom stops to look up and listen, just another audience. Cliché, yes, and a sign of directorial ineptness, but still a tribute to supersized performance.

A newspaper man to the bone, McAffrey comes on like a pig ("I showed her a little snout") when a pretty young blogger (Rachel McAdams) dares to invade his messy lair. Unkempt, kinda pudgy and gravel-voiced, he's an unlikely knight (Crowe's scruffy pageboy makes him look like an over-the-hill Prince Valiant), an anachronistic "truth-seeker." The role's hardly Oscar bait, but that doesn't detract from the fun of watching Crowe work his mojo. He's the engine that drives this thriller.

Other cast members are trotted out at intervals -- like gourmet snacks -- for showboating "turns." Superb as a senior, seen-everything legislator, Jeff Daniels smoothes all concern or suspicion with oleaginous smiles and gestures calculated to move things along -- his way. As easy as blinking, he can erase a man and walk away before the fellow even realizes he's become invisible.

And channeling Ben Bradlee, Mirren's whip-smart, a tough broad you'd like to know. But she's the editorial equivalent of the irascible police chief who pops up periodically to berate his off-the-rez detectives. Confronted by McAdams pleading to stay on a story, the white-haired Brit snarks, "Don't throw those dewy cub reporter eyes at me -- it's nauseating." Snap! McAdams' whole performance nailed in a single phrase!

Would that all of "Play" crackled with such lethal wit and style!

Kathleen Murphy currently reviews films for Seattle's Queen Anne News and writes essays on film for Steadycam magazine. A frequent speaker on film, Murphy has contributed numerous essays to magazines (Film Comment, the Village Voice, Film West, Newsweek-Japan), books ("Best American Movie Writing of 1998," "Women and Cinema," "The Myth of the West") and Web sites (Amazon.com, Cinemania.com, Reel.com). Once upon a time, in another life, she wrote speeches for Bill Clinton, Jack Lemmon, Harrison Ford, Joe Pesci, Robert De Niro, Art Garfunkel and Diana Ross.