Images Courtesy of Sony Pictures
'Stranger than Fiction' review
Will Ferrell does his clown song playing a character, literally and literarily, in his new film
By Sheba White
Published: October 8th, 2006 | 6:19pm
Directed by Marc Forster (Monster's Ball, 2001; Stay, 2005) and written by Zach Helm (Mr. Margorium's Wonder Emporium, 2007), Stranger than Fiction is the meta-fictional tale of tax-auditor Harold Crick (Will Ferrell), who finds himself the primary tragic figure in blocked-writer Kay Eiffel's (Emma Thompson) long-awaited novel and isn't too pleased with the impending scripted death.
Comparisons to Jim Carrey's Truman Show and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Charlie Kaufman's Adaptation, and Adam Sandler's Punch Drunk Love abound, primarily regarding the storyline's fantastic-realism aspect and in the counter-casting of Ferrell as the dour-faced, methodical Crick.
There's no doubt about it, this is Ferrell's Bill Murray/Michael Keaton comedy to dramedy move. But Ferrell gives a clean enough performance here, complete with requisite eye-twitching (Keaton) and subdued, hesitant dialogue (Murray) to warrant positive future speculation, and is a soothing counterbalance to Thompson's overwrought Kay Eiffel, a character written in such spectacular writer-clichés - severely-inhaled cigarettes, rummy eyes, and pasty complexion - as to seem as though she is overacting, when indeed it is the melodrama of the script.
Quirkiness seems to be the key aesthetic tone of the film, from Forster's use of mathematical overlays (inexplicably dropped a quarter of the way through the film, presumably in response to Crick's increasing awareness of his own mortality, but resonant of shticky music video practices or Gap commercials, nonetheless) to the preponderance of archeological artifacts in the scenery (Dustin Hoffman as Dr. Jules Hilbert sporting a claw necklace while an animal husk is displayed prominently on his desk) to Eiffel's intermittent voiceover (also mostly dropped a quarter of the way through the film).
Thank the powers that be, though, for such dead-on casting - Linda Hunt, Queen Latifah, and Dustin Hoffman as sobering interlocutors between Crick and Eiffel, Maggie Gyllenhaal in the highly unlikely, but lusciously-absorbing performance of Crick's love interest, and the truly quirky charm of Tony Hale as fellow auditor and best geek friend Dave. It's these unexpected, subtle cameo performances that will probably make Stranger than Fiction a cult classic, no matter if it breaches the meta-film levels with its instant quirky familiarity.
Issue #34
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