Review: The Adjustment Bureau (2011)

I heard about this one long ago, when it first came out, but also heard that it wasn’t really worth spending my money on.  So, finally, I got around to watching The Adjustment Bureau, if only out of curiosity.  As it turns out, it really wasn’t worth the watch, even know I didn’t have to spend money on it.  For while the concept was very intriguing, the director and the majority of the cast put this thing together so poorly that if not for the presence of a few well-known names, it would have gone straight to the bargain bin at Wal-Mart.

The story begins with David Norris, a man in politics.  While losing an election, he runs into a beautiful girl, Elise, in the men’s room.  They click, but she has to flee from security (she’s there crashing a wedding), so their ways are parted.  Eventually they come back together, but there are people that have a vested interest in keeping them apart - the members of the titular Adjustment Bureau.

These creepy guys are basically angels, working for “The Chairman” to keep things on Earth running smoothly.  It seems that every time they leave humans alone to deal with their own problems, bad stuff goes down, so they’re here to stay.  They decide that David and Elise can’t be together, so then it’s up to them to stop the pair from becoming involved.  Unfortunately, David is having nothing of it.  He defies their attempts to thwart him and they eventually have to tell him all about whom they are and why he needs to back off.  Of course, he doesn’t listen that well - else there would be no story.  So the rest of the movie is David vs. the AB, a growing relationship between David and Elise and some interesting chase scenes.  In the end, God says “Cool!” and lets them be.

While the premise sounds interesting (even in the caustic way I’ve described it), the execution was absolute crap.  Matt Damon (aka David) and Emily Blunt (aka Elise) have great chemistry on-screen, but those highlights are few and far between.  Almost every other actor seems like they’re not even trying.  And the dialogue is so expositional I feel like I might as well have been reading a book.  The ludicrous nature of certain of the film’s elements, such as using a special, magic hat to navigate the angels’ secret doorways, could have been interesting, but combined with the rest of the film’s flaws it just makes it all seem like something that Mystery Science Theater 3000 would have a field day with.

The folks over at Rotten Tomatoes gave The Adjustment Bureau a very generous 76/67%.  Me, I wouldn’t give it more than 30 or 40 percent, and that only due to Damon and Blunt saving it from complete catastrophe.  In the end, I was left wondering how such an interesting concept could have turned out so utterly bad.  Then the credits rolled - based on a story by Philip K. Dick.  Ah, that explains it.  They’ve butchered yet another of his works.

Unless you can hang by a thread and appreciate what the film might have been despite what it turned out to be, I highly recommend avoiding this one completely.  Or if you dig on bad sci-fi, go for it.

Photo Credits -           

Adjustment Bureau courtesy of coolpapae.com