Soderbergh makes something ordinary quite human.

Rating: 6/10 (28 October 2011)

On paper, there was no reason for me to love this. A film with Julia Roberts in the title role, playing a loud and brass woman who takes on a court case, filled to the brim with standard moments of the underdog being beaten but refusing to give up and ultimately attaining victory. Somehow with everything going against it, the curveball of Steven Soderbergh in the director's chair got me to really appreciate something I was destined to loathe. Soderbergh is constantly challenging himself as a director and someone with his independent upbringing and sleak, digital style taking on such a plain-Jane underdog Oscar-fare story is probably the most diverse move in his career at this point. He brings a genuine humanity to it that doesn't exist in films like this, treating even the smallest throw-away characters the same way that the title character herself treated them, as if they mattered.
I've never seen a Julia Roberts performance that I've liked, but in this one she was charming, witty and an all-around joy to watch. I don't think she sold the emotional moments as well as she should have, but any moment with her standing up to the fat cats that she takes on is a real crowd-pleaser. The film shines brightest anytime she shares the screen with Albert Finney, the two of them having a love/hate working chemistry that does nothing but delight. Whether they're butting heads or reveling in each other's company, these two are a real treat to see together. Finney takes a stock character and turns him into someone flawed and genuinely human. Which is what Soderbergh does with this film as a whole, taking something relatively standard and somehow adding an authenticity to it that makes it work.