Will Ferrell is Stranger Than Fiction

Yes time does play a big role in our everyday lives. Every day I have to go to work at a certain time, or school. I need to eat, sleep and perform a variety of daily tasks. We must follow a schedule in order for our lives to run smoothly, but imagine calculating and timing your daily activities down to the second. This is the life of Harold Crick. Harold Crick, played by Will Ferrell, lives by the sound of the very tick of his wrist watch. Will Ferrell, as Harold puts you into his obsessive compulsive life that doesn't hold an ounce of excitement.

At first you might think you are watching a normal narrated opening of Harold's life, until the movie becomes exactly what the title explains, stranger. The movie takes its twist when Harold wakes up one morning taking part in is daily ritual of brushing his teeth and calculating every brush stroke. Everything is going to plan in his orderly life, until he thinks he hears his tooth brush talking to him. He stops brushing which is out of the ordinary, since he follows a strict time schedule. He looks at his brush and says "hello" to it. This is the breaking point in the movie where the audience begins to realize that Harold Crick might actually be insane. Will Ferrell will make you laugh as Harold's day progresses.

You don't realize that he is actually hearing a real voice, and that he is not crazy until he goes to work and starts becoming distracted by this women's distinct British voice, Karen Eiffel played by Emma Thompson. Harold goes about his work day distraught by the voice that only he can hear narrating his every move. Harold becomes frantic when he is standing in line to catch the bus after work, and the women's voice reveals his "imminent death." Will Ferrell makes you feel the urgency of Harold's search to find out how he will die. The movie takes a more suspenseful turn as Harold goes on a wild goose chase to find out exactly how he can prevent his own death, before he comes face to face with it. Harold seeks help by getting in contact with Professor Jules Hilbert, a professor of English Literature, played by Dustin Hoffman. Harold explains that he is being followed by a women's voice and that he needs to find out how he will die. Professor Hilbert comes to the conclusion that Harold is a character in a book, and comes up with a series of questions to rule out genres of literature. The professor sends Harold on a mission to find out if he is in a tragedy or comedy.

What he doesn't know is that Karen Eiffel an author trying to make a come back in her career is writing his life at present and is working on how she will kill Harold Crick, the main character in her upcoming novel. The movie comes together when Harold finds out that he is a character in Karen's book, and begins to desperately search for her so that he can prevent his "imminent death". I won't reveal how the movie concludes, but it brings the audience back down from suspense to relief. Will Ferrell has definitely made a new jump in his career for an actor that is not only comedic, but serious. You see Will Ferrell in a whole new light in this brilliantly written screenplay, Stranger Than Fiction, written by Zach Helm and directed by Marc Forster.