A Character Sketch Gone Crazy

Stranger Than Fiction

The New York Sun, November, 10, 2006

There are some desserts, just a few, that are perfection itself. There are plenty more, glutinous, sticky, cloying, annoying, that tip over into a sickly sweetness and simply disgust. Then, trickiest of all, there are those that teeter uncertainly along the edge, promising delight on one side, threatening nausea on the other. They generally end up delivering both. In this respect they resemble nothing so much as Marc Forster's sharp, saccharine, original, clichéd "Stranger Than Fiction," a film that infuriates and enchants, and is, without doubt, the best date movie I've seen this year.

So far as saccharine is concerned, a quick glance at the advance publicity materials turned up danger signs by the sachet load. The movie was not just funny, but "sweetly funny." It was also "heartfelt," "deeply moving," and "deeply emotional. "When, to top it all off, I read that Ana the love interest (Maggie Gyllenhaal) was billed as a "free-spirited," "anarchist" baker, there was nothing to do but be apprehensive about the prospect that lay ahead. Deeply.

Sure enough, if it's syrup you're looking for, "Stranger Than Fiction" is a movie splattered with gobs of the stuff, above all in a final sequence that equals, and may even exceed, the repulsive aspartame-saturated conclusion of "Love Actually." The producer of "Stranger Than Fiction" has claimed that the last moments of his film are "a beautiful tribute to the little things in life that are, in the end, our salvation" — a grim boast that tells you all you need to know.

As for clichéd, let's just say we've all been down the boring-corporate-stiff-transformed by-love-for-free-spirited-girl route many times before, even if making the free-spirited girl an anarchist baker is something of a novelty. But if the core love story itself is not particularly original, the same cannot be said of the context within which it is set. Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) is not just a boring corporate stiff (IRS actually, but you get the point), he's also the hero of the latest novel ("Death and Taxes") by reclusive author Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson), something he only discovers after hearing the disembodied voice of the novelist narrating exactly what the unfortunate taxman is up to. This would be disconcerting at the best of times, but these are not the best of times. As Crick comes to discover, Karen is busily working out how she can kill him off in the final chapter. Somehow Crick, fictional, yet real, has to contact his creator and persuade her to end "Death and Taxes" on a less lethal note.

The script may not be quite as clever as writer Zach Helm likes to think ("From Pirandello, to Brecht, to Wilder, to Stoppard, to Woody Allen, to Wes Anderson," he writes in the press material,"we an see the progression of a contemporary, self-aware, reality-bending and audience-involving wave in dramatic literature … ‘Stranger than Fiction' is simply my abstraction of it."), and the logic of the plot falls apart from time to time, but the premise is so interesting that it cannot fail to intrigue. This is less because of the collision of author and character — an old conceit that is not by itself enough to carry a movie ("Monkeybone," anyone?) — than for what the film has to say (or, just as often, imply) about the way we all have to struggle with the uncertainty of life and the inevitability of death.

As if that weren't substance enough, "Stranger than Fiction" also addresses the question of what exactly the big man upstairs (if He exists) thinks He is doing. The clue that this somewhat meaty topic is part of the movie's agenda comes in a brief aside from Karen, barely audible, and over in a second or two, in which she tells a TV interviewer that she doesn't believe in God. It's a moment that is easy to overlook (perhaps deliberately so), but it's surely a hint that this film's meditations on the nature and responsibilities of creation are intended to take its audience into a more provocative place than the self-indulgence of most Hollywood musings on the creative process.

Karen, unlike certain other creators I could mention, is finally forced to dispense with the dishonest alibi of free will and come to terms both with her creation — her Harold — and with the actual human cost of the destiny she has sketched out for him. She might look at what she has written and see that it is good, but will that be enough for her to live with Harold's tragic, but artistically pleasing, death?

If all this sounds, you know, a little heavy for a date movie, don't worry. Like the far better "Groundhog Day," it's perfectly possible to enjoy popcorn, hormones, and "Stranger Than Fiction" without being bothered too much by the deeper issues lurking just below the sheen of its romantic comedy surface. Besides, like "Groundhog Day," this film offers audiences the engrossing spectacle of a comedy icon (then Bill Murray, now Mr. Ferrell) delivering a performance of unexpected delicacy, subtlety, and depth. Mr. Ferrell disdains the lazy cliché of the solitary, dried-up, and obsessively compulsive tax drone in favor of a far richer, sometimes even tragic portrait. As a result, Harold's growth and transformation (bolstered by terrific set design and clever cinematography) is all the more convincing and, yes, touching.

The former Ron Burgundy is not let down by the supporting cast. Ms. Gyllenhaal's Ana (the anarchist baker) may come across, initially at least, as being as smug, self-righteous, and preachy as all the other anarchist bakers you've ever met, but her warmth, smile, and not-quite-explicable sexiness make it easy to understand just why Harold is so smitten. Ms. Thompson, meanwhile, is splendid as usual, even if, as usual, it's impossible to avoid the impression that her acting is Acting with a capital "A," acting that is trying just that little bit too hard. By contrast, as Jules Hilbert, the professor of English who helps Harold work his way through this most unusual of literary conundrums, Dustin Hoffman's seemingly effortless performance purrs along like the smoothest and most expensive of engines. Even if it's fueled by occasional pieces of ham, it's so entertaining that it would be churlish to complain.

In fact, on balance much the same could be said for "Stranger than Fiction" as a whole, so go and see it, but if you — or your date — are diabetic, cynical, or just lacking a sweet tooth, it might be just as well to leave before the sugary excess of that final scene.