The Adjustment Bureau

It’s hard for me to review ‘The Adjustment Bureau’. It gets to this point when it becomes extremely difficult to focus and concentrate on a film when, besides your (my) general cinema and Hollywood knowledge, I already read the script. To add this matter, there’s also the actors knowledge. I saw this film knowing the story, knowing the characters (also the actress’ mannerisms, her accent, her laugh, basically her body language) and knowing that the story has some flaws and it’s hard to work and no matter the ending, it’s a story that will always carry a doubtful and unsatisfying end. The only thing I didn’t knew about the film was actually how it would end. This resulted in a very rational experience!

A young New Yorker politician, David Norris falls in love with a woman, Elise. But their destiny has different and separated paths, when an agency secretly unknown and unrealistic starts to follow him, questioning his life’s plans and trying to separate him from Elise.

It’s a story that tells us that love surpasses pretty much everything. No matter how good or bad, things that has to happen to you will happen, so in a way there’s no good when you try to run from destiny. The film focus essentially on this premise, and establishing the story in a sci-fi/futuristic world helps to mark the fact that despite the whole science evolution, our feelings and specially the importance of share them with others it’s what gives the ultimate meaning and significance to our life. (Is that true? You might ask.)

Always trying effortlessly to watch the film naturally I felt from the first part of the film that the audience doesn’t really know what’s going on and doesn’t have any clue who Elisa might be. She’s still a mystery to them and they could easily think of her as the villain or some spell or fantasy! Then everything comes to audience’s knowledge when David Norris sees Elise on the bus making everything fall out of plan.

This is a very daring story to us, audience, because it becomes a very skeptical one. There are lots of questioning situations, especially for those who ask a lot and like to be seeing everything reasonably used. For example why ‘the rain’ excuse for the agency’s men lose their power, the ‘hats’ (you can find a reason to these characters’ use of a hat, although it can still not work in the film), the fact that a man can live with the burden of knowing that people adjust civilian’s lives (this personally was very confusing for me), ‘the boss’ that commands all others and is watching all of us, taking the character’s career of unprecedented success and turn into a failure if they choose to be together (although we also might understand that, maybe, it’s just an easy excuse of leading Norris to separate from Elise), so you probably  understand this questions.

When it comes to the final act the skepticism takes its leading point, when Elise is confronted by this unrealistic and mysterious world she just jumped in, realizing that someone holds her destiny. We all end up with an uncomfortable feeling; at least I had, because it’s hard to accept that there are people ‘watching them’. (Spoiler – when they kiss and start walking on the streets just made me laugh like a stupid person because no one was laughing in the theater). I think the bottom of the story isn’t really about what comes next and isn’t really about the ending, but about telling us that we have to struggle, always, for something we believe and love no matter how our fate might look.

 

The film is entertaining and there’s laughable moments, delivered by funny dialogues and good action involved. Matt Damon is probably one of the most pleasant Hollywood actors with the boldness for doing versatile work. Emily Blunt, well maybe I shouldn’t talk about her since I already talk about her too much! Ok I just would give a note on the slight accent and her laugh…there’s also the Ballet Dance sequences (one of the things I was most curious about) which she took months of training, which she didn’t had a clue how to do it. There is this impact on the Ballet dance not only because they were very beautiful but because I didn’t get quite over the ‘Swan Lake’ ballet scenes, if you know what I mean…

Bottom line, if you want to see a fictional story when what really is interesting is the journey and not the end or if you like action involved with romance…or if your favorite actors are Matt Damon, Emily Blunt, Anthony Mackie, Terrence Trap or other cast member this is a good film you might enjoy!