AmericanPapist Comments
Thanks, Thom. My American Lit. Moby-Dick paper on whether or not Ahab had free will flashed before my eyes. I also had several echoes of Dr. Russell come floating back to me. On the Iliad: "Only the best authors can still tell the story after giving away the ending." Sounds like Thompson is play the ultimate "God" game. I haven't seen the film, but the trailers did intregue that Literature-Major part of my soul.
This sounds kind of like Donnie Darko, one of Dr. B's favorite movies after Bladerunner... Except in Donnie Darko, the character is stuck in an alternate universe and learns he can choose to die in his true reality for the betterment of all.
I think your review is spot on! I LOVED this movie. Brilliant. It's heart is definitely Christian, whether the scriptwriter intended it or not.
I'm really enjoying this new magical realism that's been developing in hollywood following Charlie Kaufman's lead. I'm a big fan of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, but I thought Stranger than Fiction was even better. I read some cynic reviewer who interpreted it as nothing more than "carpe diem crap," but that just shows what you lose when you don't have any "Papist glasses" to bring the world into focus.
I loved the movie too. Hollywood sees redemption as passe, corny and syrupy. Just as the Resurrection is embarrassing for Jesus Seminar scholars, happy endings are for Hollywood screenwriters. Nihilism is hot. So how to deal? To admit mediocrity up front? Dustin Hoffman's character, the lit crit in the movie, says the writer's new, happy ending made the book only "average". He saw the author's re-writing as resulting in the loss of a poetic, lasting, tragic work of art.
But in the end the author (Thompson) determined it was more important to bring joy. She argued that she never intended the character have foreknowledge of his death and the joy he brought to others made her keep the character around.
I liked the Christ parallels. Ferrel knowingly gives his life for a child. Beforehand he goes to Hoffman and says, basically, "is there any way this cup can pass?". Hoffman replies in the negative and explains the poetry of it, the rightness of it and how the book will last forever. Ferrel's character accepts this and sacrifices himself for the child and the art - and yet he does not die but lives.
Btw, some screenwriters hate it, and this might be one of the cases where if you're too familiar with film-making, many films are ruined for you. Reminds me how many Scriptural scholars find no joy in Scripture, getting hung-up on technical details or "mistakes" while missing the whole point.
I thought the movie was decent but was upsetting because the previews presented it as a comedy, and it's not... but i like your review
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