If you are a fan of the film adaptations of the John Grisham legal thrillers, you might find quite a bit to like about The Lincoln Lawyer, a courtroom drama that treads on familiar ground in an effort to lead to a fairly predictable conclusion. It's not particularly memorable.
Matthew McConnaughey stars as Mick Haller, a high-powered lawyer who operates (mostly) out of his Lincoln Town Car, shepherded around by a besuited driver. At least that's the idea – he's in the car for maybe three or four scenes. Anyway, he's been hired by the family of a rich lad, played by Ryan Phillippe, who's accused of battering a woman in her home after she picked him up at a local bar. But it's not long before Haller realizes that the case may have something to do with an earlier case of his, one in which his client (Michael Pena) wound up being sent to San Quentin. Seems like there may be quite a bit more to this rich kid's case than meets the eye.
Haller is typical of the heroes you see in those Grisham novels/films. He knows when to play the system and when to buck it. He's a family man, even though he and his wife, played by the luminous Marisa Tomei, are divorced. He puts in long hours to work on his cases – and why not, he gets a lot of money for doing so. He has an experienced investigator, played by a scruffy-looking William H. Macy. He doesn't have the affected twang of a Grisham hero, so his shtick here is his omnipresent Lincoln. Except when it's not present, which is really quite often.
Matthew McConnaughey tries his best, just as he does in most movies, but he's just up against too much predictability. As likable as he can be in character – even when he's a bit of a jerk, like in Tropic Thunder, which got him this gig – his likability can only carry a picture so far. And although it helps that there are a lot of talented folks in the movie with him, their cache combined just isn't enough to overcome the overwrought, indifferent, cliché-riddled plot. McConnaughy is charming and sly, working the refs so effortlessly as an ethically challenged lawyer, that you almost forget that the conclusion is basically forgone. Oh, sure there's a twist, if you can call it that. The movie even wants us to believe there are two of them.
But The Lincoln Lawyer is just full of McGuffins, too many incidental characters who nevertheless Mean Something, and way too much wasted talent. It's done in by implausibilities and the notion that only the Hero can figure anything out – if he doesn't, it means he's been set up or lied to. It's even sort of repetitive to have McConnaughey as the lead here; he already had the experience of being the Hero in the adaptation of Grisham's A Time to Kill.
So, skip it. When your movie's big hook is that your hero operates his law practice out of his car, and then you show him driving himself around in other cars, or being driven around in other cars, or being in court, or basically doing everything but conduct business out of the back of his car, then you have no hook. And, ergo, no movie.
