SOLITARY MAN (2010) (***1/2)

Michael Douglas has made a career of playing morally reprehensible men. In 2010, he played two. Here and in the WALL STREET sequel, he plays a powerful man who has fallen from great heights and is trying to claw his way back to the top. The main difference is that Ben Kalmen is no Gordon Gekko. Kalmen is his own worst enemy.

Kalmen owned one of the most successful car dealerships in the North East. In his ads, he billed himself as the honest dealer. Turns out he was a crook. Now clear of his legal problems, he is trying to rebuild his reputation. He's finding it impossible to gain another franchise license, because the car manufacturers don't want to be in business with someone who screwed them royally in public.

So what does he do but seduce the daughter of a powerful man who can pull the right strings. Jordan Karsch (Mary Louise Parker, TV's WEEDS) knows exactly who he is and seems to know exactly what he is doing, but doesn't care. She's attracted to power and he radiates it. As a favor to her, he takes her teen daughter Allyson (Imogen Poots, 28 WEEKS LATER) to visit his alma mater where he gets her in to meet the president. There are buildings named after him there. She would rather die than go with him, but he lets her loose on campus, which makes peace. But he really impresses her when he questions her possible hook-up with a guy she just met by asking her what's in the deal for her?

Kalmen has a way of impressing people right from the start. He has confidence and tells you how it is. The latter can also make people hate him a minute later. While visiting the school, Daniel Cheston (Jesse Eisenberg, THE SOCIAL NETWORK) is assigned to be his student guide. He's a shy, smart kid who Kalmen is determined to get laid by the end of the night. Kalmen quickly becomes poor Daniel's social guru.

Things are looking up for Kalmen, but then he screws it all up. He makes a really bad decision that costs him it all. From there things are only downhill and he doesn't really help himself out along the way with his attitude. He is alienating himself from his daughter Susan (Jenna Fischer, TV's THE OFFICE), who is starting to believe her husband that her father is not a good presence in her life. His college best friend Jimmy Merino (Danny DeVito, ROMANCING THE STONE) has his back, but Kalmen has a way of making it difficult to want to help him, because he's such an ass. His ex-wife Nancy (Susan Sarandon, DEAD MAN WALKING) still remembers the electric guy he was in his youth and wonders how he's become a cliche of a man trying to forget his own mortality.

As one would expect from the actors mentioned above, the film has first-rate acting. Poots, DeVito and Eisenberg stand out, but this is really Douglas' show. He plays a man struggling with mortality. In the first scene, his doctor tells him to go in for some tests, which he avoids. Knowing Douglas' own recent battle with cancer and his womanizing rep, the performance takes on an eerie weight. His character is a man who wants to leave life with no regrets. Sadly he seems to be amassing a lot of them whether he wants to admit it or not.