Mick Haller (Matthew McConaughey) is a slick L. A. lawyer who operates out of the back of his Cool & the Gang style Lincoln Continental. His license plate reads “NT GUILTY” and that’s because he manages to get his various sleaze-bag clients off the hook. To complicate matters, our Lincoln Lawyer’s wife (Marisa Tomei) is an attorney as well. Except she works for the District Attorney’s office and it’s the very criminal clients of her husband’s that led to their divorce/differences in the first place. Enter Louis Roulet (Ryan Phillippe) a seemingly squeaky-clean rich playboy son to his mom (Frances Fisher) who will do anything to keep him safe. When Louis is accused of brutally attacking a woman, he pleads “not guilty.” But when the Lincoln lawyer’s investigator (William H. Macy) discovers some unexpected information, everything goes haywire. Suddenly, what seems like a slam-dunk case, becomes a deadly game of survival, especially since attorney-client privileges are about to backfire. If the classic L A Confidential twisted with crooked detectives, this one twists with its bad clients. That said, while it’s not on that level of great film, it’s refreshing to see McConaughey pull off a drama after his usual brain-dead rom coms. Three and a half tiaras
