Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
:: Stranger Than Fiction ::
by William the Bloody
Harold Crick is an IRS agent and his world is awash in numbers. He know exactly how many steps it takes to get to the bus on the way to work, he can multiply two six digit numbers in seconds, and brushes his teeth the same number of strokes vertically and horizontally at every go. It is during one of these counted teeth brushings that Harold becomes aware of a woman's omniscient voice describing his every move. No one else is around; he has no idea where this disembodied voice is coming from, and it gets worse when he realizes that nobody else can hear it. It gets even worse still when he hears the voice tell him that resetting his watch will cause his immanent death. His coworkers are troubled by his odd reactions to seemingly nothing and gets evaluated by the IRS's counselor, who recommends vacation. Harold sees a real psychiatrist who recommends prescription medication. Not believing himself to be crazy, Harold goes to see an expert on literary narratives, a University professor. The professor wants to toss him out, but once Harold recounts some of the narrative, the professor can't help but be curious. Working together, Harold and the professor try to determine what kind of story he is in and who is writing it in order to save his life.
The Good: I'm not a Will Ferrell fan, but this film turn me around. Ferrell proves here that he can be funny, witty, charming, and heartfelt without resorting to goofy antics. I would equate his performance here to Jim Carey's greatness in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. And while I'm at it, I'm just going to go ahead and praise every actor on this project. Seriously, Dustin Hoffman, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Emma Thompson, and yes, even Queen Latifah offer up some great work here. The story of an actual man being a real live character in an ongoing fictional work is so unique and original, I can't applaud it enough. It's so bizarre, but you feel like you can believe it with everyone's excellent performances. The direction is also superb. When going over Harold's life of numbers, neat little charts and graphs pop up on the screen to illustrate his thinking process, but they're such a cool device and chock full of symbolism and finer meaning.
The Bad: This movie may require too much suspension of disbelief for some people. Also, don't go in thinking this is a straight up comedy, because you could get blindsided.
Overall, this film was awesome. It was such a different, classy and intelligent film for Will Ferrell to star in, but I'm glad he did. You really get to care about his character as well as all of the others that you'll find yourself going a little misty in eyes near the climax. Stranger Than Fiction is so smart and sophisticated, but also cute and funny. I loved it and I can't wait for it to be available for me to own so I can love it a pet it and call it George.
A+
