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Stranger Than Fiction film review
STRANGER THAN FICTION
Running time: 113 mins
Starring: Will Ferrell, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman, Queen Latifah
Having established his reputation as a big, manic goofball, Will Ferrell follows the tradition of so many comics in wanting to be taken more seriously. Jim Carrey is a prime example of how to derail a successful career by trying to make the transition. Ferrell, however, fares far better in the brilliantly offbeat and ingenious Stranger Than Fiction. While still a comedy, Ferrell drops his usual schtick in favour of a tender, low-key performance which suggests he will have a shelf life beyond the expiration date of his crazed screen persona.
Ferrell plays solitary, mild-mannered tax inspector Harold Crick whose ordered life is regimented by a case of OCD and his wristwatch. Nothing has disrupted his daily routine for twelve years until suddenly one day he starts to hear a voice eloquently describing his most prosaic actions, like cleaning his teeth. "I'm being followed by a women's voice," he explains to a bemused colleague. "She's narrating."
The film's complex structure interweaves Harold's plight with the one facing celebrated author Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson) who has struggled for ten years to complete her book Death And Taxes. "I don't know how to kill Harold Crick," she confides to Penny Escher (Queen Latifah), who has been dispatched by Eiffel's publishers to help the author overcome her writer's block. When the real Harold hears Eiffel's narration in his head talking of his imminent death, he's desperate to contact the reclusive writer in the hope of getting her to change her ending before he meets his.
An auspicious debut from screenwriter Zach Helm, Stranger Than Fiction possess the eccentric and inventive wit of Charlie Kaufman's work and is deftly directed by Marc Forster who confirms he's as versatile as he is gifted following Monster's Ball and Finding Neverland. Such high concept premises require skill to pull off effectively, something Forster has managed with sensitivity and subtlety. And though very much set in the real world, the film is imbued with an otherworldly sensibility.
Adding further to its appeal are the performances of Dustin Hoffman as eccentric English professor Jules Hilbert, who tries to help Harold figure out his role in the story of his life, and Maggie Gyllenhaal as anarchic bakery owner Ana Pascal, who Harold audits before falling in love with. Even stranger than fiction is the inclusion of Wreckless Eric's sublime romantic obscurity Whole Wide World. That the film's genius extends beyond its soundtrack is further proof, were it needed, that where there's a Will, there's a way.
Kevin Murphy
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