Theron, by contrast, is devastating. Her descent into hysterical despair is the film’s moral anchor. When she begs Kevin to leave the firm, her eyes hold the only genuine terror in a movie otherwise drunk on its own cleverness. That she received no major award nominations is a crime the devil would appreciate.
The Devil’s Advocate is a movie of immense, almost arrogant potential. It wants to be Wall Street meets The Exorcist , a legal thriller soaked in supernatural dread and moral philosophy. It succeeds as a guilty pleasure. It fails as the masterpiece it so clearly aches to be.
There is a moment, about two-thirds of the way through Taylor Hackford’s The Devil’s Advocate , where Al Pacino—corporate Satan, Manhattan real-estate mogul, and part-time father figure—turns to the camera and delivers a monologue about God’s greatest mistake: giving humanity free will. It is a symphony of ham, spit, and terrifying sincerity. For five minutes, the film achieves a kind of operatic madness. Then it remembers it has a plot to resolve, and the spell shatters.