Sunday, 17 March 2013

Stranger than fiction - review


Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) leads a very solitary and boring life as a tax auditor. Every day is the same until he meets Ana Pascal (Maggie Gyllenhaal), a baker who enjoys avoiding tax. As he spends day after day going through her taxes, he begins to fall for her, but with his repetitive way of doing things and lack of social interaction, he doesn’t make a very good impression.

One day when Harold is carrying out his daily activities, he begins to hear narration of his life. With no idea who is saying it or why, he becomes aware that only he can hear it and so consults a doctor. Adamant that he is not schizophrenic, he wonders whether he is in fact a character in a story and so makes contact with literary professor Jules Hilbert (Dustin Hoffman) in the hope that he will be able to help him.

After trying to work out what kind of story Harold is in, Jules advises him to track down his author, but with no way of finding out who she is, Harold happens to hear his narrators voice, Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson) on a TV interview and is shocked to discover that as an author she always kills her main character.

In an attempt to persuade her he is real and not one of her characters, Harold tries to track down reclusive Karen who with the help of Penny (Queen Latifah), a publishing assistant is trying to fight writers block and finish Harold’s story. But will Harold meet her in time to convince her not to end his story?

With Will Ferrell as the lead in this movie I was expecting it to be a lot more comedic and fun, but instead found myself bored stiff. I like the concept of the movie, but feel it would have been more suited to someone whose main genre of movies isn’t comedy.

Having wanting to watch this movie for a while I ended up buying it on DVD, but I can’t see myself reaching for it again – it will go straight into the collection to be sold.

Definitely a film flop.

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