Scarlett plays Nora Rice, who is hitched to a rich scion of a tremendous family business and property, Tom Hewett. Enter the main protagonist of the film, Chris Wilton, played by Jonathan Rhys Meyers, who starts the film as Tom's tennis coach and ended up getting married to Tom's sister, Chloe. From a lowly tennis coach, he finds his social and financial luck improve vastly.
Chris got entangled with Nora in a web of betrayal and sex, each cheating on their own partners. The sexual tension between the two got so bad that they had to bone in a field in the middle of a thunderstorm. Lucky bastard.
So things didn't work out between Nora and Tom, and instead she got mixed up with Chris who was doing well in the family business and muddled his relationship with wife Chloe. Things came to a head when the affair threatens his newfound luxurious existence and he decided to take matters into his own hands, coming up with a devious plan.
Filmography wise, I thought the directorship of Woody Allen was excellent. Scenes not vital to the buildup of the characters were skipped fleetingly; you see Tom's father talking to Chris about taking up business courses and next scene, voila, Chris is sitting in an MBA class. The buildup of the story and the moving of the climax (no pun intended) was excellent.
The main protagonists in the film, mainly Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Scarlett Johansson, played up their roles to great aplomb. You can feel the sexual tension, the need to feel each other, the want and desire for each other. Other than cursing the lucky bastard for most of the show, I thought Jonathan Rhys Meyers displayed great humility in the beginning of the show, but someone whose intentions you can never be sure of. Towards the end, he has blossomed into a confident business partner, great at covering his tracks, displaying traits of a wonderful husband, etc. I thought he did a great job at morphing his character from a lowly tennis coach to an up-and-coming successor. Scarlett on the other hand, went from vixen to irritating-third-party but that's the way it should be.
But being a huge fan of Scarlett, I could never get enough of her. You mean, you could? I guess my only gripe about this movie is the limited airtime that Scarlett had (compared to The Nanny Diaries). Dang!
Throughout the movie, I could feel myself in the shoes of Chris, from the attraction to a beautiful girl (Nora) to the guilt of a philandering husband, to the desperation of a man down and out and the fear of a wanted criminal. Few movies could make me feel the main character as well as Match Point and I really applaud the effort.
Poignantly, Match Point drives the importance of luck in one's life, over effort and virtue. Two characters from similar backgrounds with such different outcomes. I thought the following monologue from the movie was so true:
People are afraid to face how great a part of life is dependent on luck. It's scary to think so much is out of one's control. There are moments in a match when the ball hits the top of the net and for a split second it can either go forward or fall back. With a little luck it goes forward and you win. Or maybe it doesn't and you lose.
Would you rather be lucky over good? I would.
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