I still wonder why it won so many awards

Rating: 7/10 (23 May 2005)

The story behind this movie is one that just had to be filmed. This is the kind of true story that appeals to so many people that there is absolutely no-one who would dare NOT to make movie out of it. So there were two options, either it would be filmed with a rather big budget, getting a chance in the cinema's, either it would end up as a cheap TV-drama. The makers chose the first option and that's a good thing...
Erin Brockovich is an unemployed single mother. She's desperate to find a new job, but every interview ends up in disappointment because she doesn't have the right qualifications. And to make things worse for her, she also loses a lawsuit against a rich doctor who hit her in a car accident. She has no alternative left but to go to her lawyer and to 'ask' him for a job (threatening is a better word for it). She gets a job and while no-one takes her seriously, because of her trashy clothes and her lack of manners, she begins to investigate a suspicious real estate case involving the Pacific Gas & Electric Company. Soon she discovers that the company is trying quietly to buy contaminated and polluted land in a residential area. But as she digs deeper, she finds enough evidence so the law company can sue the million-dollar corporation.
Normally I would say that the underdog is a likable figure and most of the time that is true, but not in this case. A woman that swears as much as the Erin Brockovich in this movie and who doesn't mind to be so aggressive to so many people, really isn't very lovable. At least not in my opinion. OK, she may have had a hard time, but that still isn't a good reason to act the way she does. (I really hope the real one isn't like that, because you can't buy style and class and this is really about as low as you can get).
About the acting I can be rather brief. Julia Robert's performance was decent, but certainly wasn't good enough to win an Oscar with it. Sure, it's the perfect role to seduce the Academy with, but all she really did was showing a lot of cleavage and talking dirty (which sometimes was really funny, but not always). All the other actors and especially Albert Finney, as the lawyer and head of the company, were OK. I don't really have any remarks on their performances. They weren't spectacular, but did what they had to do.
All in all this isn't a bad movie, but it certainly isn't worth all the awards that it received. This rather thin and, if I didn't know better, unbelievable story is pure TV-material. A bigger budget wasn't enough to make me forget about that. In the end this movie is worth a watch, but it certainly isn't as great as some people want you to believe. I give it a 7/10.