Stranger Than Fiction (4½ Stars)

I've known about this film for years, but I never bothered watching it. It stars Will Ferrell, so it must be a comedy, and I've never liked his type of comedy. Putting it simply, I don't find him funny.

Today the film was presented in a group where we watch films together once a month, and my friend Anna called it one of her favourite films. So I watched it, and I realised that I'd got it all wrong. It's not a comedy at all. I'm not sure what genre it belongs to. Could it be deemed a supernatural fantasy? I'm not sure. It depends on the way the film is interpreted.

Will Ferrell plays Harold Crick, an aloof but highly disciplined IRS auditor. His life follows a strict schedule, for instance he goes to bed at 11:13 pm every night. He lives alone, and he doesn't have any friends, apart from people he talks to at work.

One day he starts to hear a voice narrating his life. The voice isn't talking to him, it's talking about him, telling unknown listeners what he's doing. It's unsettling, so he visits a psychiatrist, who tells him he's suffering from schizophrenia. Harold isn't happy with this diagnosis, so he asks if any other specialists could help him. After putting the psychiatrist under pressure, she finally advises him to visit a literary expert. He seeks help from Jules Hilbert, a literature professor. Based on the formulation of the narration he takes Harold seriously and says he's a character in a book. It's now up to him to find out what type of story he's in, a comedy or a tragedy.

Finally he meets the author Karen Eiffel, who's writing a novel about Harold and is unwittingly controlling his life. In her book Harold has to die, but she can't decide how he should die.

I'll stop the description there. It's a powerful film with deep philosophical ramifications. If we accept the premise that it's possible for someone to control the life of another person with his typewriter, how should the author and the character deal with it? How would I personally deal with it if it happened to me? My tendency would be to sit down with the author to discuss how I want to die, but that's not what happens in the film.

This is an amazing film that I want to see again. Soon.

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