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Stranger than Fiction

Posted by jamesgarvin (A) on July 11, 2007 at 08:46:21

How refreshing, a film which takes the written arts seriously, almost celebrating the english language, and refuses to dumb down to the audience, using crude, moronic one liners. A film which assumes its audience has a certain level of intelligence, which will rise to the occasion.

The films stars Will Ferrell as an I.R.S. auditor, whose life is reduced to numbers - same number of strokes of the toothbrush, same arrival time at the bus stop, same lunch time, for the same period of time. Shortly into the film, he begins to hear a narration of his activities as he is doing them. A voice nobody else can hear. Not knowing where to turn, he shows up at a Phychologist's office, who tells him that he is schizophrenic - but he calmy tells her that the voice does not tell him to do anything - it is only narrating his life. She suggests he see a literary professor. Seems reasonable.

So he meets with a literary professor, who is played by Dustin Hoffman. Maybe it is only me, but it seems to me that he has been searching for a role to fit in - he seems shoehorned into too many roles because of his name. Here, he has found his role. At first he thinks Ferrell is crazy, and wants to dismiss him, until Ferrell recites some prose from the narrator, which, Hoffman concludes, I think, that this I.R.S. agent cannot create.

So Hoffman tries to narrow down which author is narrating Ferrell's life. In a very funny sequence, he asks Ferrell twenty-five questions that he has written to determine the author - questions such as "Do you have special powers" - designed to eliminate some fairy tell authors.

In the mean time, Ferrell has arrived at the bakery where Maggie Gyllenhaal works. He is auditing her, and she explains that she pays 78% of her taxes because that is the percentage that goes to things like helping children, the elderly, etc. They soon develope a love affair, which changes his life for the better.

But then... He learns who his narrator is. She is an author played by Emma Thompson. The Problem, according to Hoffman, is that Thompson kills off all her characters. So Ferrell sets to find her, and convince her that she needs to not kill him. Presumably, if she sees her subject is real, she will reconsider.

And here is where the film developes some real complications, and real questions, for everyone. Thompson tells Ferrell that she has written, but not typed, the ending. She gives the manuscript to Ferrell, who, unable to read it, gives it to Hoffman. Hoffman, with perfect tone, tells Ferrell that "you have to die. It is a masterpiece. It is the best book she has ever written." He then, in a very funny, and thought provoking sequence, explains why this death, at this time, is necessary, and better than whatever end, at whatever time, Ferrell would face anyway. He almost had me convinced.

Ferrell reads the book, and concludes that, yes, it is a great book, and he must die. Perhaps Ferrell, in an otherwise pointless life, concluded that the book provided him something his life was missing? A purpose? He tells Thompson to keep the ending. Have there been other subjects who have died at her typewriter? She wonders. How much should one sacrifice for art?

A film that plays like sort of like a comedy, or a romance, or a drama, but all of the above, and, none of the above. There are some funny scenes to be sure, I replayed a couple of times the scene of Ferrell in the publishers office trying to find where he could find Thompson. But the comedy was never over the top, the scenes never set up to telegraph the "joke", which was played as situational comedy rather than a one liner zing.

Ferrell does a very good job in what is really a dramatic role. He delivers some funny moments, allowing the dialog to be the star, letting the well written lines breathe like a fine wine rather than shoot them out like a shot. Those who saw him in the little seen "Winter Passing" may understand his range. I think he has a good future as a dramatic actor if he choose to pursue it, and it appears that he does.

Hoffman finds the right notes in his performance. He delivers some funny moments in his twenty five questions scene, and in his justifying Ferrell's death scene. None of the little smirk we sometimes see from him to let us know he is joking. He takes two goofy scenes, and plays them so straight, and serious, that he had me convinced this character was convinced he was serious.

Thompson was her usual dependable self. Maybe it takes someone British to utter well written literary lines, and not make them boring? She perfectly plays the suicidal author with writer's block, and then when the book is finished, plays the English woman we have come to know.

The end of the film is very sweet and honest, yet does not reduce itself to being sappy. It is very true to the film, and perfectly logical. Some films which set themselves upon for a sad ending seem to have the ending re-written after a test audience has watched it. Not here. Very recommended.

Edits: 07/11/07

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