Stranger Than Fiction (2006)

Story: Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) is an IRS auditor leading a dreary, repetitive existence until he is sent to audit a baker, Ana Pascal (Maggie Gyllenhaal). Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson) is struggling to finish her latest novel with no help from the publisher's assistant (Queen Latifah). The very novel Karen struggling to finish happens to be about Harold, and, when Harold realizes that the narrator he has been hearing is determined to kill him, he determines to find her. To this end, he enlists a literature professor (Dustin Hoffman).

As a director, I find Marc Forster pretty hit and miss. Screenwriter Zach Helm has written exactly one made-for-TV movie. Despite their short comings, this movie is a delight. The very premise is enchanting.

Ferrell gives a career best performance. He is wonderfully subtle and nuanced in the role. I don't want to give too much away about this scene, but there is one where he hits the exact right note of clever and dorky. I loved that.

Although Hoffman was likable in his role, it kind of felt like he was merely playing a more lucid version of his character in I ♥ Huckabees. On the other hand, when he begins waxing rhapsodic on "little did he know," a moment like that is a dream come true. You can see the fun the actor is having - it's impossible not to be infected by it.

Thompson decided to act the hell out of her role. Very few people can bring such delightful quirk to desperation in my opinion.

Gyllenhaal was also a welcome breath of fresh felicity. I have worried that there is a little similarity in the roles she has played in the past, so this movie serves as a welcome reminder that she can (and does) branch out.

As much as I like Queen, I don't really get the point of casting a name of such stature in a rather small role. I feel like a great number of other people could have gotten the job done just as well.

Unfortunately, Helm turns the whole thing rather oddly dramatic toward the end. Even worse, he goes sentimental on us. I get that writing about writers writing is a difficult task, and, in a way, it is a brave choice. I'd say that not changing the ending would have been a braver choice, but I'm not certain that that is true. Either way you'd end up feeling like you've gotten the short shrift. The problem is that the very conceit of the movie is self-defeatist. Harold knows he's going to die. Either he's going to die or he's going to live. There's not a lot of wiggle room there.

Logistics aside, this movie is the kind that would be described as a "feel good" movie. It's more than that - it's a feel better movie. B+