Susan Granger’s review of “Deception” (20th Century-Fox)
What a waste of talent and money! Burdened with the ineptitude of commercials director Marcel Langenegger, this forgettable wannabe thriller fizzles.
It begins with corporate auditor Jonathan McQuarry (Ewan McGregor) working late in the conference room of a prestigious Manhattan law firm. An amiable attorney, Wyatt Bose (Hugh Jackman), pops his head in the door and introduces himself. Eventually, they’re sharing marijuana and male bonding. Wimpy, socially awkward Jonathan opens up to confident, gregarious Wyatt, admitting, “I see life, literally, passing me by.”
They meet for tennis, then for lunch in Central Park, where they accidentally swap cell phones just before Wyatt jets off to London on a business trip. Answering Wyatt’s cellphone opens a decadent new world for lonely Jonathan when a woman’s voice seductively inquires, “Are you free tonight?”
The cellphone contains “The List,” the conduit to an upscale sex club where anonymous members meet for “intimacy without intricacy.” After timid trysts with some randy Wall Street executives (Charlotte Rampling, Natasha Hensridge, Maggie Q), Jonathan falls for a mysterious woman (Michelle Williams) whom he can only identify by the initial “S” from the letter on her key ring and is gradually drawn into manipulative Wyatt’s lethal web of treacherous financial intrigue; it’s a slick blackmail scam that grows increasingly preposterous as time goes by.
Written by Mark Bomback (“Live Free or Die Hard”), the clunky concept must have seemed far better on paper to attract actors of this magnitude who soldier on despite the ludicrous plot twists and total lack of eroticism. So when does enigmatic become incoherent? In the hands of an inexperienced director. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Deception” is a devious, implausible 2, a deadly, duplicitous dud.
