The Repentant Devil’s Advocate: Narrating Slow Violence in Michael Clayton and Dark Waters

Abstract

[Abstract] Gradual environmental violence, what Rob Nixon calls “slow violence,” poses obvious representational challenges for filmmakers due to its agential and temporal dispersion. In sharp contrast to the direct filmic appeal of “fast” violence, slow violence is not readily visible to the camera. That is why film directors trying to narrate slow violence need to rethink their cinematic strategies and, on some occasions, create new ones. This essay intends to tease out the strategies employed by two “whistleblower” films, Haynes’ Dark Waters and Gilroy’s Michael Clayton, in order to overcome the obstacles found when representing slow violence. I argue that the insidious threat of slow violence can find an analogical equivalent in suspense: the baleful nature of slow violence would thus be extrapolated to the fear of physical violence that plagues thriller heroes. In thrillers the threat of conventional violence is always there, even when it does not eventually take place. Both Dark Waters and Michael Clayton can be considered legal ecothrillers and, as such, they resort to suspense; however, while Gilroy still makes concessions to fast violence, Haynes opts for a different set of strategies, starting with the very pace of his film, which echoes the rhythms of slow violence.