Mike Nichols' Closer, from Patrick Marber's play, watches two couples, Dan and Alice and Larry and Anna, swim about in their own private aquarium of unrequited intimacy. Coupling and recoupling, they use sex for many things—as a means of status, as a profession, as recreation, as revenge—but never successfully as a way of getting closer to one another. Indeed, in the film's most dynamic scene, Larry and Dan (Clive Owen and Jude Law) use sex (with Anna) as a club to beat one another bloody, at least emotionally so. The four of them remain to one another, in the words of Alice at an exhibit of Anna's photography, "sad strangers, photographed beautifully."

Natalie Portman rises to the challenge of the half-dozen different wigs and hairstyles that Alice takes on, continually trying out different identities. As Anna, Julia Roberts does solid if not outstanding work. We never quite understand what's going on with her, and we wonder what it is about her that attracts Larry and Dan.

The score, apparently uncredited, is sometimes obtrusive, particularly in the opening and closing sequences of Alice walking down the street.

posted: 5:37:15 PM