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BY MAGGIE SCOTT

George Clooney has hit social-consciousness pay dirt, again. “Michael Clayton” is a worthy, multi-Oscar nominee contender, from its craftsman script to its formidable performances.

If it doesn’t redeem a profession compared to chum guzzling sharks, it’s a whopping good turnaround for one lawyer. White knuckle from the get-go, it starts out with the panicked testimony of a hit-and-run driver desperate to avoid prosecution, moves on to a car explosion, followed by a lawyer stripping off his clothes during a deposition.

Clooney is Clayton, an attorney at Kenner, Bach, Ledeen law firm, which is slogging through a suit involving an exfoliant and about 400 litigants. The firm’s client is U-North, marketer of calcitate, the accused, carcinogenic chemical. The protracted struggle to spare the company a trial has claimed a victim of another stripe: Arthur Edens (Tom Wilkinson), KBL’s point man for U-North’s defense, appears to have gone around the bend after six years of “absorbing this poison, defending a deadly weed killer.”

Believing Clayton will get the point of his ravings, Arthur shares his epiphany with all the colorful intensity his bi-polar condition can conjure: “This is not an episode; this is not madness.”

Clayton, an accomplished, but low-rung “fixer” for KBL has got his own difficulties. Not only is he a divorced dad and backroom gambler, the corner bar he opened has hit the skids, and it looks like he might as well “get out a treasure map and start digging” to find the money he needs to save it.

Arthur’s loose cannon status is a potential disaster for KBL, because he’s talking to one of the litigants, he’s found incriminating documents, and he’s concerned about his legacy. At first, Clayton talks tough. Get back on your meds, he says, when he hears Arthur talk about the blood on his hands. You’re manic-depressive, he says, when he realizes Arthur has switched loyalties and is licking his chops at the prospect of taking down his former client. KBL is thinking kidnapping and straitjackets.

Foul play reactivates Clayton’s past skills as a former D.A. with a family history of law enforcement, and he upgrades from “janitor” to sleuth. Although this case has caused her increasingly sweat-drenched meltdowns, with billions of dollars at stake, U-North’s general counsel, Karen Crowder (Tilda Swinton), is not about to let anyone blow her out of the water.

Director Tony Gilroy’s chiseled script expertly funnels the suspense for a stand-up-and cheer finale.
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