Matcollis This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Softwing Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

Livestonth I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

Edwin The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

Jackson Booth-Millard I knew about this film because of the leading actor, and I knew it was something to do with lawyers, so I hoped it would be worthwhile, based on the book by John Grisham (The Pelican Brief, The Client, A Time to Kill, The Rainmaker), directed by Sydney Pollack (They Shoot Horses, Don't They?; Tootsie, Out of Africa). Basically Harvard graduate Mitch McDeere (Tom Cruise) is an up-and-coming young man with a promising future in law, he is offered opportunities in law firms across America, including Chicago, New York and Los Angeles. Mitch settles on small, boutique firm Lambert & Locke in Memphis, Tennessee, which specialises in accounting and tax law, he and his wife Abby (Basic Instinct's Jeanne Tripplehorn) move. One of the firm's senior partners, Avery Tolar (Gene Hackman), becomes his mentor and introduces him to the firm's professional culture, loyalty and strict confidentiality are demanded, and lawyers should be willingness to charge exceptional fees for their services. Over time Mitch is seduced by the money, gifts and other perks showered on him and his wife, but within a couple of weeks two lawyers are savagely murdered, the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice approach Mitch and warn him that the firm he is working for is heavily involved in criminal enterprises for a Chicago mob family. Mitch is also warned that many young lawyers have been killed while employed by the firm, he soon confirms there is indeed corruption, racketeering, mail fraud, homicide and gross over-billing of clients by the firm. Mitch knows that he is trapped, he must help the authorities or face prosecution himself, or he must stay with the firm or suffer death from the firm security enforcers. Mitch and Abigail concoct a plan to hand over confidential files to expose the criminal activities of the firm to the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice, but the firm's sinister security agents, headed by chief Bill DeVasher (Wilford Brimley), are in hot pursuit of Mitch, they will stop at nothing to silence him and protect their interests. Also starring Hal Holbrook as Oliver Lambert, Terry Kinney as Lamar Quinn, Ed Harris as Wayne Tarrance, Oscar and BAFTA nominated Holly Hunter as Tammy Hemphill, David Strathairn as Ray McDeere, Gary Busey as Eddie Lomax, Steven Hill as F. Denton Voyles, Saw's Tobin Bell as The Nordic Man, Barbara Garrick as Kay Quinn, Jerry Hardin as Royce McKnight, Orphan's Margo Martindale as Nina Huff, Breaking Bad's Dean Norris as The Squat Man, Karina Lombard as Young Woman on Beach, Paul Sorvino as Tommie Morolto and Joe Viterelli as Joey Morolto. Cruise had tackled being in the courtroom in A Few Good Men, he is pretty suited as the rising young lawyer who discovers the dark side of his prestigious law firm, the star- studded cast all do their parts well also, I could just about follow the story, there are some suspenseful scenes of chases and the violent moments when the dodgy superiors get nasty, the only problem was that the film was a little long and the subject matter is a little dry, overall it is a reasonable legal thriller. It was nominated the Oscar for Best Music, Original Score for Dave Grusin. Good!

George Wright The Firm is a major disappointment, lacking the drama and characters that are such a strong part of the book. From the start, we get little appreciation of the characters, particularly Mitch McDeere (Tom Cruise), the Harvard trained lawyer from the wrong side of the tracks who hopes to live his version of the American Dream. He joins a law firm in Memphis with an offer that is quite literally too good to be true. When he realizes he is in a nest of vipers, he finds himself in a no win situation between the law firm and the FBI, which has been trying to bring the firm to justice. The soft jazzy music throughout this "thriller" is an constant irritant that only lengthens the boredom of this tiresome piece of film-making. I was misled by the page turner of a book by John Grisham that gave readers so much entertainment back in the early 1990's. Tom Cruise is too much the movie celebrity to fit the role of Mitch McDeere. Gene Hackman has a key role as his mentor but doesn't fit the bill either. To me he is always Popeye Doyle from the French Connection movies. I did find Wilford Brimley and Ed Harris, on opposite sides of the organized crime machine vs. the law, to be the most convincing, although their performances were lost in this forgettable movie. By all means, read the book but take a pass on the movie.

jmillerdp Tom Cruise's character is officially the dumbest lawyer who's ever lived! He doesn't ask a question when a supposedly small Memphis law firm offers him far more than a Wall Street firm. Really? And, it's all downhill from there in John Grisham's impossibly laughable pulp thriller.Grisham has always turned out potboilers, melodramatic legal tales that strain credulity. But this, his first, is even more impossible to believe than most!The film is reasonably made. But, a competently made film that has a truly Loony Tunes blueprint is just that. And, the believability just gets more and more strained as it goes.Dave Grusin attempts a one-instrument-only film score with performing the whole thing with only a piano. It's an admirable attempt, but it just doesn't work. Bernard Hermann created an all-string film score for "Psycho," but that included the full string section: violins, cellos, bass violins, etc.This movie is such a joke! Embarrassing.** (2 Out of 10 Stars)

seymourblack-1 Anyone who has experienced poverty or hardship in their early life never forgets the experience and always retains a certain element of insecurity about wealth, regardless of how much financial success they later achieve. In "The Firm", it's this phenomenon that essentially drives a brilliant young law student to ignore numerous offers of career-enhancing opportunities from a number of prestigious big city law firms to, instead, join a small Memphis partnership who offer him a fantastic remuneration package. Unfortunately, what follows, perfectly illustrates the wisdom of the old adage that "if something seems too good to be true, it probably is".Mitch McDeere (Tom Cruise) is the Harvard Law School graduate from a poor background whose exceptional academic achievements lead to him being head-hunted by "Berdini, Lambert & Locke". The firm offer him a huge salary, a low-interest mortgage, a Mercedes and the repayment of his student loans and in return, Mitch readily agrees to join them. After relocating to Memphis with his wife Abby (Jeanne Tripplehorn), he quickly settles into the practice and regularly works long hours. Initially, he's comfortable with the firm's family ethos and doesn't share Abby's unease about some of the advice she receives such as "the firm encourages children" etc. A little later, however, when he realises that a high percentage of the firm's work is related to the activities of the Mob and a couple of the firm's lawyers suddenly die in mysterious circumstances, he gets the strong feeling that something sinister is going on.Mitch's suspicions are confirmed when he gets approached by the director of the FBI and Agent Wayne Tarrance (Ed Harris) who inform him about the firm's criminal and money-laundering activities. They want Mitch to supply them with information and documents to be used as evidence to bring his employers to justice and add that if he doesn't co-operate, things will be made very difficult for his brother who's in jail facing a manslaughter charge. They also emphasise that Mitch effectively doesn't have any choice in the matter because no partner has ever left the firm alive and if he simply decides to stay with the firm, he could face 20 years in prison when they go down, as they inevitably will.Mitch knows it would be impossible to pass on the documents that the FBI want without breaching the confidence of his legitimate clients and taking that action would inevitably lead to the loss of his licence to practice law. He therefore realises that in order to meet their demands without losing his career, making his brother's parlous situation worse or winding up dead at the hands of his ruthless employers (or the Mob), he needs to devise an imaginative plan to get out of the trap he's in. When he then discovers that the firm have routinely been over-billing clients for some considerable time, he starts to see an opportunity to formulate just such a plan but, of course, its success is by no means guaranteed.Based on John Grisham's bestselling novel, this glossy thriller was understandably a huge box-office success. It's intriguing, tense and highly entertaining and features a whole collection of great performances from its star-studded cast. Surprisingly though, it's Gary Busey, Gene Hackman, Ed Harris and Holly Hunter that really bring the screen to life in their relatively small parts while Tom Cruise and Jeanne Tripplehorn also do well in their starring roles.