If a person or company has enough money, they can pervert the law and get away with anything, even murder. But what happens to the people who help them pervert it, and what are they really fighting for? This is the question confronted by the characters in Michael Clayton, one of the best films of 2007.

Heading up the stellar cast is George Clooney as Michael Clayton, a shadowy corporate fixer (he calls himself a janitor) whose sole job is to help his legal firm's ultra-rich clients evade the law and make crimes disappear, whether it's a hit-and-run accident or a shoplifting heiress. Tom Wilkinson plays Arthur, the top lawyer at Clayton's firm who is driven insane by a combination of manic depression and the realization that he has devoted way too much of his life to helping a company called U-North get away with killing hundreds of farmers with a known carcinogenic weed killer. Tilda Swinton rightly won the 2007 best supporting actress Oscar (despite looking exactly like Eric Stoltz at the awards ceremony) for her portrayal of Karen Crowder, the newly appointed head of legal counsel for U-North who quickly finds herself in over her head as she attempts to manage both Arthur's meltdown and the fears of U-North's anxious shareholders. Rounding out the cast is Sydney Pollack as Marty, the head of Clayton and Arthur's law firm.

Expertly written and directed by Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton is an excellent, twisty legal thriller for grownups that doesn’t condescend to its audience, despite a fairly tidy summing up at the end. But what I found most fascinating about it is its indictment of American capitalism and the wounded and destroyed lives it can leave in its wake. Just like the tobacco industry, the heads of U-North signed off on a product they knew would kill innocent people in order to make a profit, and when the bodies started piling up, they both hired the best lawyers their considerable wealth could buy to avoid any accountability. After all, if you aren’t found guilty, who can say you did anything wrong? But what’s so interesting about this film is that the battle for truth and justice does not take place in a courtroom — it takes place in backrooms, lonely moments, and the consciences of the highly paid lawyers tasked with defending the indefensible. Lawyers who can afford the finest beds and sheets, but are unable to sleep in them.

I saw this movie with a friend who said that Arthur’s insanity is really the appropriate reaction of a man who realizes he’s dedicated a huge chunk of his life to aiding the powerful and destroying the innocent in exchange for a pile of money. As Americans, we’re constantly taught that money will provide happiness and should be pursued at any cost. The lawyers in Michael Clayton would disagree.