The Berkeley Beacon

Issue date: 11/9/06 Section: Arts and Entertainment

Media Credit: courtesy of Columbia Pictures WIll Ferrell screams for an end to the mediocrity of Stranger Than Fiction. [Click to enlarge]

In screenwriting, a clever idea is a very dangerous possession. It's even more daunting when that clever idea is bizarre and otherworldly. Can the execution transcend the thought-provoking concept?
In Stranger Than Fiction's ambitious case, not really.

Stranger Than Fiction wears its ingenuity on its sleeve and is forcefully concerned with reasserting its attempted quirk and wit. It may be a playful exercise in self-conscious meta-narrative, but, ultimately, it's perniciously shallow, even when searching to find depth in its typical themes.

Most of the film is so preoccupied with reinvigorating the surface sharpness of its premise that it only flirts with its theses on the nature of the narrative and the human condition. There's no room for truly incisive commentary in this overstuffed production.

The symbolic stand-in for humanity in Stranger Than Fiction is its tightly programmed pawn, Harold Crick (a surprisingly tolerable and relatively restrained Will Ferrell).

Harold is disturbingly comfortable in his antiseptic, solitary world of suits and perfectly tied neckties. After 12 years of working for the IRS, he finds solace in uniformity and conformity. The modern architecture that surrounds him is metallic, ostentatiously geometric and very cold, reminiscent of Jacques Tati's bleakly contemporary landscape in Playtime.

The imperious narrator explains that Harold is a man of "infinite numbers, endless calculations and few words."

As Harold brushes his teeth one Wednesday morning-counting each brush stroke-something abnormal occurs; he begins to hear a voiceover of his life. It accurately documents every move he makes and every thought he thinks. This omniscient voice belongs to Karen "Kay" Eiffel (a perfectly cast Emma Thompson), a chain-smoking, neurotic novelist who has not completed a book in nearly a decade.

Karen is physically introduced into the film while standing on the ledge of a skyscraper, staring down at the pedestrians as they perform menial functions; she clearly represents a God-like figure, but she is unaware of Harold's human existence. This motif is pushed even further when the audience and Harold learn through her voiceover that she plans to kill off Harold Crick.

Continued...

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