For an actor renowned for having a twinkle in his eye, George Clooney takes quite a risk in this downbeat but gripping legal thriller. He barely raises a smile as the eponymous "fixer" for a huge Manhattan legal firm, who's struggling with a failed marriage, a gambling habit and crushing debts following an ill-advised investment. When top attorney Tom Wilkinson suffers a breakdown and switches sides during a long-running case involving an agrochemical giant, Clooney is dispatched to deal with the fallout. First-time director Tony Gilroy (who won his spurs writing the Bourne trilogy) handles the mostly wordy action with confidence - unravelling much of the story in flashback and drip-feeding the facts. Clooney is magnificently moody and troubled, and Tilda Swinton and Sydney Pollack provide knockout support as, respectively, conniving counsel and Clooney's boss. It's not quite up there with the similarly themed Erin Brockovich, but this is still powerful, intelligent adult fare.

A law firm brings in its "fixer" to remedy the situation after a lawyer has a breakdown while representing a chemical company that he knows is guilty in a multi-billion dollar class action suit.