Screenscene: "Stranger Than Fiction"

“Stranger Than Fiction”

Director Marc Forster

Columbia Pictures

Harold Crick, the main character in “Stranger than

Fiction,” is a very unremarkable man. He lives in an

unremarkable home with unremarkable furniture and holds an

unremarkable job. He has an unremarkable life.

And, unfortunately for him, Harold Crick is also the subject of

a rather unremarkable movie.

In an age where one is hard-pressed to find a truly fresh and

original screenplay, “Stranger than Fiction” opens on a

high note. After that, it seems there is no place for the film to

go but down.

In the film, Harold (played by goofy comedian Will Ferrell)

suddenly begins to hear a voice in his head, narrating and

predicting his every move and thought as he goes meticulously

through his routine day.

At first it is an oddity, a minor inconvenience, until one

morning the narrator speaks of his “imminent death” and

Harold is propelled into doubt, dismay and self-discovery. He

eventually finds the source of this distinct voice to be that of

famed yet loopy writer Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson, “Love

Actually”) and as soon as the true form of her once-fictional

character is discovered, the question looms: to kill or not to

kill.

The film’s gimmick is a good one, but it is a much

different story in actual execution. The entire second half

examines the possible onset of our hero’s sudden death

““ leading to a search for the meaning of life better left to

the Hallmark Channel, rather than a Will Ferrell film.

On his quest, Harold falls for a woman named Ana, played by

Maggie Gyllenhaal (“World Trade Center,” “Happy

Endings”), and the lack of chemistry between the two makes it

difficult to take pleasure in Harold’s long-awaited

happiness.

In an all-star cast, Gyllenhaal is great, but Thompson steals

the show with her primarily voice-over role. Ferrell adapts well

from the frat humor for which he is famous, but there is still

something left to be desired both in his character and his

performance.

In order to find the woman behind the voice inside his head,

Harold is constantly asked if his story is a comedy or a tragedy;

it seems someone should have asked the same question behind the

camera as well.

E-mail Stanhope at kstanhope@media.ucla.edu.

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