Stranger Than Fiction Review
by Jerry at the Movies (Faust668 AT msn DOT com)June 10th, 2007
STRANGER THAN FICTION (2006)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
RATING: Four stars
"Stranger Than Fiction" is a fascinating film, and its fascination stems from a screenplay that aims with a delectable charge to remind us of what movies can be. It is a sparkling, imaginative delight from start to finish, with enough humor, chaos, light sentiment, big laughs and a tightly woven screenplay of supreme intelligence to remind us that films need not always cater to the dumb and dumber set.
Ferrell is Harold Crick, an orderly, lonely IRS agent whose domicile seems not unlike the one that Edward Norton occupied in "Fight Club." It is a bland apartment with all the cosmetic appliances one might expect - it may as well be a model apartment. He is finicky with his wristwatch, which is used as his alarm and his basis for punctuality. Nothing wrong with being punctual but Crick even estimates the time it takes to get from his bus to crossing the street, to the actual office building he works in, etc. Now that is punctuality (we even see horizontal and vertical lines drawn with estimation of time and space, not to mention number of meters between spaces). At his workplace, every time he passes colleagues who ask him a multiplication problem, he answers correctly without missing a beat. Yes, people of the planet Earth, I am discussing a Will Ferrell flick.
One day, Crick hears a voice in the bathroom while brushing his teeth. The voice describes Crick's actions in explicit detail. Crick thinks the voice is coming from his toothbrush. When he is at work, he hears the voice. When he is at a bus stop, he hears the voice. When he performs a tax audit for a tattooed bakery shop owner, Ana Pascal (Maggie Gyllenhaal) whom he is smitten with, he hears the voice. Is Crick going insane or is there a feminine, British-accented voice he can only hear? Is this a ghost who thinks she is an author? The mind boggles.
It turns out the voice belongs to a living, successful author, Kay Eiffel (Emma Thompson). Every book of hers ends with the lead character dead. She is trying to think of how Crick can meet the Grim Reaper. It is driving her crazy, and naturally it is driving Crick crazy.
There are ways this film could fail. It could either turn sappy where Crick pleads with the author to save his life, since he starts a relationship with Ana, and it could all end with a neat, sunny resolution. Or it could exploit the idea of an author exploiting its lead character with a darker, bleaker resolution (well, she does want the guy to die). Strangely enough, "Stranger Than Fiction" goes with the former narrative choice, and it does it with lots of surprises and a clear sense of humanity without resorting to cliches or sappiness.
Ferrell has proven himself comic gold in "Anchorman" and "Talladega Nights," yet here he invests a restrained approach to the character and builds it with nuance and complication. We are never sure what to think about Harold Crick except that his life could be livelier and less attuned to punctuality. He is a boring individual at first, but his eyes sparkle when he first meets Ana (as we know from Eiffel's voice). And when the relationship is at first rickety and then blossoms, you wonder if the author is taking the approach of developing the character her way, or is Crick developing himself!
Then there is a sidelined character, a literature professor (excellent work by Dustin Hoffman), whom Crick turns to in the hopes of principally finding the author. Hoffman finds that Crick's life is more comedic than dramatic until...but hey, you have to see the film to find out.
This cast is almost uniformly excellent. Maggie Gyllenhaal conveys a wistfulness and a roughness with a touch of sincerity that is unusual in films in this day and age - she knocked everyone's socks off with "Secretary" and with her small, vivid role in "Donnie Darko." There is a no-nonsense sensibility about her and the character, Ana, that is reassuring and urgent. There is one remarkable scene that is handled with admirable restraint by Gyllenhaal, among many. It is when she bakes cookies for Crick without him realizing they were meant for him after he keeps resisting them. When he realizes his mistake and we observe the hurt look in her face - there is a tangible sense of regret that romantic comedies could use more of.
Also worth noting is Emma Thompson as the weary author who is in despair of not discovering the appropriate death scene for Crick. Thompson shows the author's fragility and deepens it with an emotional sensitity - of course, Thompson is known for making us care about her characters every time. Her final scene is quite a revelation, in a movie full of them.
The only flaw, and it is a minor one, is Queen Latifah as the author's assistant - there is not much need for her and her character doesn't really have much purpose.
"Stranger Than Fiction" is a stunning, marvelous, hysterical and truly profound work of art, well-directed by Marc Forster ("Monster's Ball"). Yep, I will say there is a happy ending and for once, in a world gone mad with despair and cynicism, it is earned and a keeper. A wonderful film.
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