Duplicity

Don't trust Duplicity to deliver on its promise.

Oh, it all looks nice. Tony Gilroy is an all-star Hollywood writer, and this, his second foray into directing, goes off reasonably well. Whether he could have coaxed a little more tension in the script or from his actors is a concern, however. After a boffo job at the helm of Michael Clayton, this is a bit of a sophomore slump for Gilroy.

Duplicity is a romantic comedy wrapped in a caper pic. We jump back and forth through time, following the recent lives of Ray Koval (Clive Owen) and Claire Stenwick (Julia Roberts). He's an MI-6 agent. She works for the CIA. The meet-cute comes early on at a cocktail party in Dubai (presumably before it became a ghost town), a stand-offish meeting that quickly finds its way into a hotel room.

When Ray wakes up, Claire is gone, and so are the Egyptian defense codes he lifted as part of an assignment. Zoom ahead five years later, and Koval is working for the corporate espionage unit of a toiletries company. New to the gig, he's selected to meet with a mole working within another company, and guess who she is.

The friction returns, and it seems as though this is just bad luck, unless you've seen any of the trailers Universal has been running the last six months. In truth, Ray and Claire are secretly working together to defraud the two companies out of millions. But, as with most modern caper movies, there can't be one twist. Instead, we're subjected to about 74 more reversals, including the whopper at the end that has no real relation to the rest of the movie, no matter how much it tries to show otherwise.

Beyond the unjustified ending, the movie's finish is not without some satisfaction, and the story, overall, is pretty solid. It's also a pretty picture; Gilroy takes advantage of settings and uses the small back rooms, bowling alleys, and corporate executive suites for good effect. In style and tone, Gilroy is very much like Stephen Soderbergh both in tone and style.

So here we are, with two fine actors giving relatively good performances, working with a relatively good script. But something's missing. In a movie that's a bout trust and the hilarious extremes people go to when they don't trust one another, Roberts and Owen don't trust themselves to find the humor in their situation. Gilroy, Roberts and Owen should have had a big popcorn party sleepover and marathoned a season or two of Moonlighting. Distrust and attraction can combine for comedic gold.

Much has been made about Julia Roberts' age and five-year layoff to raise her kids. It's a ridiculous sideshow that pits working moms against stay-at-home mothers, lipstick feminists against traditional second wavers, blah blah blah. Does her performance hold up after the hiatus? Sure, mostly. She's Julia Roberts; She gives a good performance and adds her mega-watt smile to the proceedings. Overall, not a bad job for someone with a little ring rust.

Owen never looked more like a George Clooney stand-in, but his animal side is a bit more restrained here than it was in The International (a mess of a movie with a truly fantastic gun fight in the Guggenheim Museum. Pay the ticket price for that scene alone). Owen risks becoming overexposed with the frequency and similarity of the roles he's been taking on. You can see a lot of the Clive-being-Clive act here as well, but you also get a sense of the potentially playful side. More of that in the future, please.

Then there are some minor characters who fully deserve more screen time. Paul Giamatti and Tom Wilkinson shine as rival CEOs who are both nearly driven mad with jealousy, contempt and distrust for each other. These two displayed all the sizzle lacking between Owen and Roberts. If the leads couldn't find the chemistry to make this movie work, then Gilroy and his editing team should have made this more on an ensemble effort.

It's not a disaster; Duplicity makes for a fun watch, and rates a date movie for a thinking couple. As a director, you can see Gilroy learning as he goes. He's got a sense of cool, for sure, but sometimes loses his grip, and that cool slips and becomes a little more aloof. Catch Duplicity in the theater if you like, but it's a better value as a rental.