Yes the romance is nice but the idea is lost and presented with such blandness that it is hard to care

Rating: Null/10 (6 November 2011)

This film offers an interesting idea regarding an unworldly force that nudges and directs the path all of our lives take, it could have done a lot with it but what it decides to do is make a romantic film within this plot. Now there is nothing wrong with that in and of itself but someone should really have a word with the marketing department who decided that a concept-thriller would be easier to sell, since that is very much the film they set their campaign around – not this one. Anyway, cheap marketing aside, I came to this film on DVD with the trailers a long distance memory and average word of mouth having lowered my expectations somewhat.
The film starts with some spark and drive to it as we are introduced to the characters and have the curtains pulled back to reveal what is really going on and the power that "they" have. At this point I was interested but as the film progressed this was slowly worn out of me. Some will say this is because I am not a romantic; while that may well be true I did actually like the romance between David and Elise, it was well played and the two had that sort of spark that was required to make me believe in them after so little time, so my problem with the film isn't that the central motivator for the events is this potential love between them. No, my problem with the film is with what it does with the idea itself – which is practically nothing.
The film has very little pace and generally it drags itself along with the audience always looking over their shoulder to see where the film is – we're already 2 steps ahead and it would be lovely if the film at very least kept up with us. It doesn't though, it plays its spiritual card very early on and it never presents a real danger or threat to be overcome – the men in hats never come off as controlling or a threat or even anything close, at worst they come off as stuffy old kill-joys and in this way they make a poor "opposition" for our protagonist. I'm not suggesting I needed this to be an action movie, but the lack of any sort of sense of threat or urgency really hurts the film because this "idea" is the majority of the film, not the romance – so to mess up the basis for your film is not going to go well.
It is a credit to the on screen presence and charm of both Damon and Blunt that the romance side of the film works well, they both held my attention and kept me interested even when the rest of the film was so very light and surprisingly bland. Mackie, Slattery and Stamp deserved better – all three of them seemed to be phoning it in without anything really going on in their performances, only the odd flutter of urgency gave them good moments but otherwise they are let down. And they are let down by writer/director Nolfi; this guy has been the writer on a couple of big money-makers but he has done himself no favours with this effort – he loses the idea and gets tied up with the romance, forgetting that the idea is the story, not the romance. He lets his cast down and he lets the audience down – it still all looks expensive and professionally done, but this is for little comfort when the story-telling is so fluffed.
The Adjustment Bureau may well be built on a good idea (I will find and read Adjustment Team) but it does very little with it. The romance at the core is engaging but the idea is lost and is handled badly. There is little of interest, threat or pace about it; it isn't a terrible film by any means, it is just so average and lacking in edge that I really found it hard to care – and the fact that I was often ahead of it in regards narrative really didn't help either.