Movie Review: Stranger Than Fiction (2006)

A dramedy with serious themes of mental stagnation and death weaved into a comic structure, Stranger Than Fiction tackles writers block, mid-life angst and the value of life within a refreshing package.

In New York City, Internal Revenue Service auditor Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) is lonely, bored and boring. He lives his life metronomically and according to strict routine. Without warning Harold starts to hear a woman's voice in his head narrating his life. Although Harold does not know this, the voice belongs to celebrated author Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson), and Harold is the main character in her latest attempt to write a book. Once the darling of the literary world, Karen is now suffering a serious case of writer's block and has not published for 10 years. She is struggling to find a way to kill Harold, as she does with all her main characters at the end of each book.

Harold is tasked with auditing the bakery business of Ana Pascal (Maggie Gyllenhaal), and finds himself helplessly falling in love with Ana. But he is driven to distraction by Karen's constant stream of narration, and gets no relief from a couple of doctors (Tom Hulce and Linda Hunt). He finally turns to literature professor Jules Hilbert (Dustin Hoffman) for help. Together Harold and Jules start to piece together the mystery of Harold's predicament. They have to figure out if he is a character in an unfolding comedy or tragedy, and how to influence the ending.

Directed by Marc Forster, Stranger Than Fiction is smart, funny and creative, as the Lindsay Doran script deploys an innovative premise to get into the head of two intriguing characters grappling with endings and beginnings. Harold, for all practical purposes, is already dead. His life is passive and he has no meaningful connections with other people. Lacking ambition and not feeling passionate about anything, Harold is marching to an inevitable and inconspicuous ending; when and how he actually dies will be generally immaterial.

Once Harold becomes keenly aware of his own impending end, thanks to Karen's interventive narration, he is pushed out of his middle-age malaise and starts to live, and suddenly dying is a big and scary deal. Harold pursues a relationship with Ana and is forced into a friendship with a co-worker. He starts to pursue a long dormant guitar passion, changes his clothes, and stumbles onto a life mentor in Jules. Now with multiple purposes driving his existence, Harold is eager to prevent his premature death.

Karen is also going through a painful mid-life crisis and is professionally dying a slow death. Now fading from memory as a once-famous author, Karen needs to unblock her creativity, and finding a meaningful way to kill Harold will spark her revival. His death will breathe life into her career, but Karen is also struggling with the perversity of her success riding on the shoulders of the demise of all her main characters. The death that used to come easily on the written page is now a struggle, forcing Karen to ponder whether the value of life comes only at the price of death.

Will Ferrell puts his frat boy humour to one side and delivers an affecting performance as Harold. Containing himself and delivering soft humour through pathos, Ferrell demonstrates appreciated depth. Emma Thompson plays Karen as anguished and borderline depressed, while Maggie Gyllenhaal presents Ana as the anti-Harold, full of life, impulsiveness and not afraid to break the rules in small demonstrations of personal anarchy.

A bright treatment of death's place in emphasizing life, Stranger Than Fiction is an adroit confirmation of enduring human realities.

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Movie Review: Parenthood (1989)

A comic drama about the joys and sorrows of parenting, Parenthood presents a rich microcosm of the challenges that come with raising kids, through many stories within five generations of one large family. Despite the sprawling narratives, director Ron Howard keeps a tight reign and allows his large cast ample opportunities to shine.

In St. Louis, Frank Buckman (Jason Robards) lives close to three of his grown children and their families. Frank's son Gil (Steve Martin) and his wife Karen (Mary Steenburgen) are doing their best to provide their three kids with a middle class upbringing. Despite Gil being an engaged and active Dad, their eldest son Kevin is tense and causing trouble at school. Gil's sister Helen (Dianne Wiest) is a single mom struggling to raise two teenagers. Her daughter Julie (Martha Plimpton) is already sexually active, much to her mother's horror, and Julie thinks that she is in love with boyfriend Tod (Keanu Reeves), who is pleasant enough but not exactly ready to support a family. Meanwhile, Helen's son Garry (Joaquin Phoenix, credited as Leaf Phoenix) is mad at the world and skulks around carrying a mysterious paper bag.

Gil's other sister Susan (Harley Kozak) is married to the nerdy Nathan (Rick Moranis), and he is an obsessive parent, insisting that their young daughter Patty should only ever be exposed to higher learning concepts beyond her years, with no fun or childlike activities. Gil's younger brother Larry (Tom Hulce) is the black sheep of the family, always looking for the next big deal, and he washes up in town broke, seeking money, and with an unplanned child called Cool in tow. With Larry having no life skills except self-delusion to fall back on, Frank has to confront the eternal duties of being a father.

Howard, screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel, and producer Brian Grazer were all dealing with fatherhood issues as Parenthood was being conceived and created, and they poured their experiences into the film. The result is a genuine movie with heartfelt emotions, filled with the humour, anxiety, unexpected drama and the delightful moments of joy and fulfilment that accompany parenting.

Of course, for comedic impact and with Steve Martin's presence, some jokes are milked to exaggerated levels, and ironically it is in the prolonged scenes when Martin is given plenty of leeway that Parenthood is at its weakest. Gil's impersonation of a party balloon cowboy is pushed to childish extremes, and there is no need for him to celebrate like a jerk when Kevin's little league baseball team finally wins a game.

But for the most part Parenthood succeeds in capturing the highs and lows of raising kids, with Steenburgen and Wiest delivering the most memorable performances. Steenburgen's Karen is happy to be the wind beneath Gil's wings as the quiet and rational force that keeps the family together. Wiest as Helen starts the movie in an utterly chaotic place, her life rapidly unravelling. Her husband has left her and she is losing influence over both Julie and Garry. But from among all the Buckmans Helen adapts the best to the ever-changing demands of parenting, and by the end of the movie she has regained the respect of her kids by taking decisions that are instinctively correct if traditionally unconventional.

Susan and especially Nathan are prototypes for parents ill-informed about what it takes to raise a well-adjusted child, pushing poor little Patty into mental adulthood at around age four. Susan snaps to reality and catches Nathan's attention just in time for him to still be able to change and rescue Patty's childhood. Susan and Nathan are the only couple in the film that have to deal with a serious wedge, and in the film's most romantic scene Moranis gets to serenade Kozak to try and salvage their relationship.

Jason Robards lends a weighty presence as the patriarch fully aware that he may not have been the greatest dad, but also perceptive enough to know that the role never really ends. The story arc between Frank and Larry is the most poignant, because Larry is most like Frank while also being the biggest failure in Frank's life, and they both know it. Tom Hulce portrays Frank as fast-talking and irresponsible, but alert to the fact that the number of people he can fool even part of the time is dwindling rapidly.

Parenthood is a classy salute to the most noble of human endeavours, celebrating all the failings and insecurities needed to make the successes that much sweeter.

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Movie Review: Amadeus (1984)

One of the grandest and most lavish movies ever created, Amadeus is a riveting story of artistic intrigue set in the suddenly captivating world of classical music.

The movie is told in flashback, with an old Antonio Salieri (F. Murray Abrham) in a mental hospital recounting his tale to a visiting priest. Salieri was the resident court composer for Emperor Joseph II (Jeffrey Jones) in the thriving Vienna of the late 1700s. Competent but relatively uninspired, Salieri was living his dream of being the most respected composer in the land until a young and playful Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart arrived from Salzburg and caused a storm in the music world.

Salieri is torn between absolute admiration for Mozart's sheer brilliance and abject despair at the gulf in talent between them. Salieri perceives Mozart as God's instrument to personally mock him, and turning away from religion he commits to destroying the young composer's career and life. Mozart marries Constanze (Elizabeth Berridge) and despite producing magnificent music struggles to make a living, with Salieri using his considerable influence to block every opportunity that Mozart has for success. Mozart also suffers through a difficult relationship with his demanding father Leopold (Roy Dotrice). In poor health and descending into grovelling poverty, Mozart is susceptible to Salieri's growing evil intentions.

The story is of course far-fetched legend, with no historian actually believing that Salieri was anything other than a contemporary rival of Mozart. Fiction Amadeus may be, but director Milos Forman adapts the Peter Shaffer play with sumptuous grandeur, recreating 18th century Vienna as a cradle of music and the arts. With a soundtrack filled with standout Mozart selections, every scene and setting is a feast for the eyes and ears, from the royal palace to the majestic performing theatres, and even Mozart's relatively humble apartment is posh. Many scenes were filmed in Prague, notably at the restored Count Nostitz Theatre where Mozart's actual operas launched.

F. Murray Abraham delivers a performance of immense intensity as Antonio Salieri, a man who believes that God is toying with him by demonstrating his failings through Mozart's effortless genius. As the old Salieri in the hospital recounting his story, Abraham dances on the edge of insanity as he finds his mediocrity ultimately amusing. In the flashbacks Salieri is the king of his music domain, having to react to a sudden threat from an unlikely source. Abraham allows the manipulative scheming to register above his ears, smiling as he hatches a plot to counter pure talent with concealed evil.

Tom Hulce brings Mozart to life as a man-child, fully aware of his prodigious talent but unable to make the leap into adult behaviour. With a high-pitched childish laugh, Hulce's Mozart is hyperactive, presumptuous and insolent, and like many geniuses unable to comprehend the limitations of mere mortals. Elizabeth Berridge, a very late replacement for Meg Tilly as Constanze, struggles somewhat to rise to her surroundings, but enjoys a few appealing coquettish moments when she pauses from her incessant demands for Mozart to make more money.

Amadeus is ultimately about the power of music, and Forman on several occasions touches sublime heights in describing the spell of perfect compositions, with Abraham entering infectious trance-like states in describing Salieri's overwhelming awe at experiencing Mozart's compositions. Another scene captures the agony and ecstasy of the creative process, Mozart and Salieri collaborating to write music, Mozart a fountain of stunningly original ideas, Salieri desperately capturing them before they slip away.

Amadeus deservedly dominated the Academy Awards, winning in eight categories including Best Film, Best Actor (Abraham) and Best Director. Much like the music of Mozart, Amadeus effortlessly entertains, educates, and mesmerises with a flawless artistic touch of magic.

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