Stranger Than Fiction
Harold crick is an IRS agent whose apartment is as bare and lifeless as a hotel room. His life is a model of buttoned-down sameness, until one day he hears a voice in his head. It’s female, British-accented and briskly ironic, and it’s narrating his life. “It’s telling me what I’ve already done. Accurately, and with a better vocabulary”, he tells a shrink, with understandable agitation. Thus begins the enticing, inside-out world of STRANGER THAN FICTION, which poses an irresistible question: What do you do when you suddenly realize that you’re a fictional character, created by a novelist (played, with neurotic nuance, by Emma Thompson) who may well wish to kill you off? First-time screenwriter Zach Helm, dancing in the footsteps of Charlie Kaufman (ADAPTATION), has crafted a comedy both funny and cerebral, wickedly smart and yet warm-hearted. And director Marc Forster finds an agreeable groove, letting the story’s essential sweetness shine through. This is a movie that feels written, not assembled; its voice is distinctive, and you never know quite where it’s going. (Moira Macdonald)
- Will Ferrell - Harold Crick
- Maggie Gyllenhaal - Ana Pascal
- Emma Thompson - Karen Eiffel
- Dustin Hoffman - Professor Jules Hilbert
- Queen Latifah - Penny Escher
- Tony Hale - Dave
- Zach Helm
- Roberto Schaefer
- Geoffrey G. Rubay
- Matt Chesse
- Britt Daniel
- Brian Reitzell
- Kevin Thompson
- Frank Fleming