Movie #155 - The Fountain

Title: The Fountain

Director: Darren Aronofsky

Release Year: 2006

Plot Summary Three parallel stories - about love, death, spirituality, and the fragility of existence - as told through the odyssey taken on by one man in his thousand-year struggle to save the woman he loves.

Thoughts: What an incoherent mess. I honestly couldn't articulate anything I felt about this movie when I came out of the theater, and that's the best I've come up with so far. The acting was all very good... and I understood what it was getting at... but that's about all I can say for it. Very, very disappointing.

Recommendations: Don't bother.

Movie #154 - Stranger than Fiction

Title: Stranger than Fiction

Director: Marc Forster

Release Year: 2006

Plot Summary: An IRS auditor suddenly finds himself the subject of narration only he can hear: narration that begins to affect his entire life, from his work, to his love-interest, to his death.

Thoughts: Let me preface this with the following statement:

Historically speaking, I can't stand Will Farrell.

Good, that's out of the way. That said, Farrell's character of Harold Crick was very good. Just the right mixture of quiet, withdrawn, lacking in any sense of social interaction, and just sort of seeping sadness instead of whacking you over the head with it. As much as it pains me to say this... Will Farrell was the best part of this movie. As for the rest... well, the acting was all good, especially Emma Thompson as the completely neurotic author of Harold Crick's life. Really didn't understand the point of Queen Latifah's character, as she didn't actually seem to do anything to justify her inclusion in the film, but whatever. Maybe it got cut.

Anywho. While the story idea was quite intriguing, I was less than enthralled with its execution. I think my main problem with it was that there were too many times when the "narration" was forgotten for long stretches at a time. On the bright side, Farrell was able to carry his character forward without this "outside help" - but it doesn't strike me as good form to have a story about a narrated life and then go thirty minutes or more without said narration.

All in all, the character was good, but the story was lacking. I would have been very interested to see Charlie Kaufman's execution of this idea - it seems like something that would have been right up his alley.

Recommendations: Probably you should go see it just to convince yourself that Will Farrell can actually act. :)