Movie Review '13 Conversations About One Thing' 2001

Don't you hate it when someone tells a joke and you’re the only one who doesn't get it? That is how I feel about the movie 13 Conversations About One Thing. After reading a large amount of positive reviews I'm left wondering what did it was I not see. The film from Jill and Karen Sprecher, the lovely minds behind 1997's Clockwatchers, tells the interlocking stories of a group of dour New Yorkers beset by strange fates.

In 13 Conversations About One Thing, Matthew McConaughey plays Troy, a brash and obnoxious lawyer who, while at a bar celebrating a court victory, meets an exceedingly sad insurance investigator (Alan Arkin) who tells him a story of how happiness can be fleeting. McConaughey is reasonably dismissive of the sad old man’s story and decides to leave the bar with a friend despite having had a few drinks too many.

On the drive home, Troy explains to his friend why his job is so great, because punishing the guilty is a worthy cause and the law is a nearly perfect system. However, after dropping off his friend, Troy is involved in an accident in which he may have killed a pedestrian. He doesn't know if the person he hit is dead because he left the scene. The young woman that Troy hit is Beatrice (Clea Duvall), a house cleaner with a sunny disposition until the accident and the resulting implications on her job and relationships changes her thinking.

Another thread in this story is about a college professor played by John Turturro who has left his wife, Amy Irving, in search of something more than contentment. His connection to the other stories is tenuous, and too unnecessary to cite. Each character we’ve met thus far, the lawyer, the insurance man, the professor, and the housekeeper, each portray a life interrupted by chance and how the chance encounters alter there happiness.

13 Conversations About One Thing is filled with these AHA! moments where the connections between the characters are revealed like the clues in a mystery. This leads to stagy dialogue exchanges that have lines that you know will payoff in later scenes. Something Turturro says in one scene is demonstrated later by Clea Duvall's character and so on and so on, as the movie fits and starts to a clunky ending.

13 Conversations About One Thing employs a shifting timeline that is at times muddled to the point of confusion. I like the concept of such intricate plotting but with the large number of minor characters involved with the four leads, things often get lost. Plot points are often glossed over unless you are looking for them. For example, in Roger Ebert's exceedingly positive review he wrote of Turturro's character being obsessed with routines, a plot point I completely missed and is, apparently, very important in understanding Turturro’s character and plot

I flat out did not get 13 Conversations About One Thing. I understood that the main subject was how obtaining even a minimal amount of happiness is the goal of everyone, but that is a rather broad point. I would hope there was more to it. Unfortunately I can't find anything more than that in 13 Conversations. I will say this, though, few films have ever started such interesting conversations. After watching 13 Conversations About One Thing with friends, we discussed it for hours, but mostly we talked about how we just didn't get it.

Thirteen Conversations About One Thing was directed by Jill Sprecher whose Clockwatchers was a remarkably strong debut feature in 1997. Clockwatchers appeared to introduce a new female voice in film who would be around for sometime.

That all changed when 13 Conversations was released to strong reviews but nonexistent box office grosses. From a business perspective, the film stopped Sprecher in her tracks and while she found success in writing since 2001, she’s directed only one feature, 2011’s Thin Ice, which was even less successful than 13 Conversations About One Thing.

Information about Jill Sprecher is shockingly limited considering the age we live in. After Thin Ice failed to find an audience, Sprecher has dropped off the radar and more than 20 years after Clockwatchers made her a rising star, she's dropped off the map entirely. Here's hoping that even though she hasn't been heard of in Hollywood terms, life has still turned out well for Jill Sprecher.