Roman J. Israel, Esq. (2017)

This is an amazing movie with 2 of the best actors on the planet! Sometimes you must have a little bit of smarts to understand the movie ... Just because a good movie like this doesn't have explosions, and gunfire does not make it a bad movie!!! Anybody who has been involved or worked in the legal field will love this movie. Also it has a message that...yes on paper we have rights, but when judges, prosecutors, police, some lawyers abuse their power and go against what this country was founded on! 100s of thousands of inmates arcross our country are falsely accused and wrongly convicted... our forefathers built our court/ justice system to have certain procedural rules and laws to prevent those things from happeng... so anytime you get a chance to learn about our country and let DENZEL explain it to you with the magic of film..... I'll take it everytime! Watch the movie it's awesome!

Fmovies: This is a BRILLIANT journey from the perspective of someone utterly detached from any personal connection to those around him.

The story is told and presented in such a way that you, the viewer, feel as detached as Roman is, but compelled to follow his journey to the end. For although he has difficulty with human interaction, and detached from humanity on a personal level, he feels a strong responsibility for humanity itself.

Denzel, as Roman, is a behind the scenes lawyer, a legal savant with some mental complications (I'm no doctor) which many brilliant people, especially savants, often face.

Colin Ferrell is a successful lawyer who finds himself perplexed by Roman's behaviors while increasingly inspired to adopt Roman's mission in life as he is reminded of the reasons he went into law himself.

As the story unfolds, you find a detached sympathy for Roman in the same way he would feel for you. How uncanny that we can be so manipulated in the acting and direction process, while some viewers leave disappointed with the movie as "flat" or bad because they couldn't get emotionally involved with Roman, silly gooses, that was supposed to happen.

Roman's emotions are absent, or sometimes buried, as in the way he continually failed to express a normal response to the health predicaments of his former legal partner, something presented from the beginning of the movie and throughout.

It's a story which moves fast but isn't an action movie, it has no needless scenes or dialogue. In addition to the story of Roman, it tells the story of one particular concern within our legal system. It certainly deserves much more than the 6.4 rating it currently has. I would give it a solid 7.5 which is quite respectable at IMDb.

DENZEL DENZEL DENZEL

I left this movie out because I thought it was a 'lawyer get mixed with the wrong guys type a movie bad guys and cops" but its really not that at all. Its about this adorable character (which I never thought I'd say that about Denzel Washington) that basically does charity through his profession as a lawyer. The movie is about moral values in a world were profit is preventing us from making the right choices.

Denzel's performance far surpasses a Oscar win, even if he doesn't win it, he did a fantastic job on this movie. Theres a scene involving a homeless person and oh how it summarises our robotic inhuman society and what we think is the right thing to do.

Denzel Washington, Sir, if you ever read this, I would like to thank you for trying your best to choose movies and roles that ASPIRE, TEACH AND INFLUENCE. I have watched all your movies and they have caused me to learn about many things and be a better person. Thank you also to the director, who wrote the movie as well.

M.J.M

Roman J. Israel, Esq. fmovies. Denzel Washington stars as Roman J. Israel, Esq. a mildly savant criminal defense attorney whose life is turned upside down when his longtime law partner passes away. Suddenly the passionate civil rights attorney who thanks to his fiery demeanor should stay far away from an actual courtroom, is left looking for a job. He is forced to settle for working for George Pierce (Colin Farrell) a successful defense attorney, whom Roman views as a profiteer who doesn't care about his clients. The entire ordeal breaks Roman, who sells out his ideals and loses sight of who he was.

Denzel gives a good performance as the extremely passionate and slightly eccentric Roman J. Israel Esq., but Roman's penchant for long rambling speeches made for tedious viewing. Colin Farrell's Pierce develops into a much deeper character than he originally appears to be and is utilized well. However, while Roman's struggle to find his identity is the core of the film it never really is able to captivate. Ultimately the film settles in as an interesting character study that struggles to come together as anything more than that. While many would be content with that, it is a disappointing follow up for Dan Gilroy after his excellent debut with Nightcrawler.

Probably the best film I have seen this year...and most definitely, Denzel Washington's performance, among the greatest I have ever seen. With this film, he is our most gifted American actor today. Last year at the Golden Globes his mannerism were so idiosyncratic...he must have been still deep inside of this character...most likely, still filming Roman. This film affected me greatly. I am so moved by this character's eccentricity, wit, grace and soul. Brilliant writing and direction. I want to see this picture again.

This film was Dan Gilroy's second directorial debut, and although his forte of experience is writing, he failed that department, and did better in his directing (camera work, but not his choice of editing).

The problem with the writing is the dragged out mumbo-jumbo Denzel Washington had to say to express his savant mentality, most of it not making any sense or philosophically unnecessary, and it extended into 2+ hours of doing so. Denzel carried his role so exceptionally well, that had this film been edited down to 80 or 90 mins by getting rid of the convoluted and unnecessary dialogue, it would have been dramatized much better.

Then there's the premise to the film; standing all this time for a cause, then slipping to the other side, then going back. What was the point? What was the message?

This film is nothing extraordinary, but nevertheless, Denzel and Colin Farrell's great acting were the only reason this film has as high (6.3) of a rating as it does, and would have been much lower with any sub-A list actors, or higher with better writing.

It's a generous 7/10 from me