'Deception' plays tricks on viewers

'Deception' plays tricks on viewers

by Andrew Jefchak | The Grand Rapids Press
Friday April 25, 2008, 8:05 AM

Hugh Jackman and Michelle Williams portray two characters who meet through a sex club in "Deception."
2.5 out of 4 stars

Rated: R for sexual content, nudity, language, violence, drug use
Cast: Ewan McGregor, Hugh Jackman, Michelle Williams, Charlotte Rampling
Director: Marcel Langenegger
Run time: 108 minutes

If you watch "Deception" with a casual eye, it's as interesting as a tough crossword puzzle. If you give scrutiny to its mysterious turns, however, you may eventually feel foolish, as if the puzzlemaker had thrown you some false clues.

Yet, despite its false leads, sheer coincidence and downright trickery, the film still manages to fascinate. By turns erotic and intelligent, Mark Bomback's script develops characters forced to change when they discover the schemes of others.

Ewan McGregor plays Jonathan McQuarry, a fastidious auditor who sometimes bites the inside of his cheek nervously and shows touches of emotion only when complaining about a leaky pipe in his apartment. One night a slick lawyer who calls himself Wyatt Bose (Hugh Jackman) barges in on Jonathan's lonely number-crunching and, within an hour, Wyatt has him sharing a joint while they sit atop a long conference table.

They form a bar-hopping friendship quickly, and Wyatt gets the meek young man in hornrimmed glasses to open up about his frustratingly dull life.

Just before Wyatt tells him he has to go to London, their cell phones get switched. This dramatic convenience, unlikely though it is, launches Jonathan's shift into a sort of double life: first pleasure, then pain.

The wrong phone gets him involved with The List, a sex club linked by mobile numbers in which the password is the question, "Are you free tonight?" The members are attractive, successful professionals who pair off anonymously at Manhattan hotels for a night of wild sex.

With the new contacts, Jonathan's evenings are enlivened considerably. The List has few rules: conversation is discouraged, name-sharing is forbidden, and they agree on intimacy without intricacy. One of his dates is with a middle-aged woman (Charlotte Rampling) he later sees on the cover of a financial journal.

His high-class hedonism continues until he hooks up with a young blonde (Michelle Williams) he had earlier been fascinated by on the subway. He calls her S because of the gold letter dangling from her key chain during the brief encounter.

Initially they don't make love, but they do make lots of conversation, and he even tries to guess her name. She in turn calls him back, and they go to a Chinese restaurant like a conventional couple. Later, they go to a hotel in the same area, but the girl disappears in the middle of the evening. After Jonathan sees blood on the bedsheets, he is struck from behind and knocked to the floor.

At about the midpoint in the film, Wyatt reappears, armed with a pistol and threatening Jonathan's life, as well as that of the girl called S. It seems he's a vicious man whose real name is Jamie Getz, and he forces Jonathan to help him steal $20 million.

In its last 30 minutes, the film grows increasingly frantic as far as plot developments go. The sinister tone is generally replaced by something closer to structural uncertainty. In plainer terms, "Deception" becomes too deceptive.

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