Dark Waters

“Fact-based” legal story about Robert Bilott’s battle against corporate giant DuPont for the release of a toxic chemical into the water supply of a small West Virginia town. Bilott (Mark Ruffalo), a corporate defense attorney himself that would usually defend companies like DuPont, swerves to the other side after he’s approached by a farmer about his dead cattle. The script is heavy-handed, over-the-top-Hollywood, where you can tell many things that are supposed to be “true” have been fictionalized/melodramatized. On one hand the movie is a complete rip-off of 1998’s A Civil Action (a much better movie, BTW), on the other it plays a very clichéd, simplistic hand…CAPITALISM BAD, REGULATION GOOD. But the worst part of the movie is Ruffalo’s hideous Southern accent. Anne Hathaway is annoying and unbelievable as usual. Tim Robbins and Bill Pullman also co-star.

[PG-13]