Double Feature

January 2009 - The start of a new year always brings new possibilities. We reflect on where we've been and promise that, this year, things will be different. Of course, it doesn't always work out that way. Maybe that's why, in the movies, alternate realities are standard fare.

Take, for example, Stranger than Fiction. Will Ferrell heads an all-star cast in this PG-13 film from 2006 about a real-life man who's trapped in someone else's novel. Emma Thompson plays the novelist. The cast also features Queen Latifah, Dustin Hoffman and Maggie Gyllenhaal.

Ferrell plays Harold Crick, an IRS auditor with a compulsion to count. His orderly life is moving along just fine until the day his watch stops. Around this time, he starts hearing a woman's voice in his head, narrating his life. That voice belongs to Karen Eiffel (Thompson), an author with a penchant for killing her characters. Harold realizes that he is a character in Karen's latest novel and that his life is being determined by her words. But, fortunately for Harold, Karen has a case of writer's block and can't figure out how to kill him.

Overall review: Ehhh, it was OK. On a scale of 1-10, I'd give this movie a 5 or a 6, mainly because of the performances. The actors manage to rise above the ridiculous plot and somehow make you care about the characters. But, ultimately, I wanted to see a movie about Harold OR a movie about Karen, not a movie about Harold and Karen.

Sliding Doors offers an alternate take on the topic of alternate realities. In this R-rated romantic drama from 1998, Gwyneth Paltrow lives something of a double life. John Hannah (from Four Weddings and a Funeral) co-stars along with Jeanne Tripplehorn.

Paltrow puts on her best British accent to play Helen, who works at a PR firm in London. The film opens with our Helen having a tough day. She gets fired, drops her earring (which is picked up by Hannah's character, named James), misses her tube train and gets mugged while waiting for a taxi.

Or, does she? The film quickly presents a second scenario in which Helen still gets fired and drops her earring, but she makes the train, sits next to James and talks to him, then arrives home to find her boyfriend in bed with another woman (Tripplehorn). Up until the very end, the film continues to alternate between the separate paths. In one, Helen gets a sassy haircut, dates James and opens her own PR firm. In the other, Helen works two jobs and takes a long time to catch on to her cheating boyfriend.

Overall review: Liked it. It's not too difficult to keep the two Helens separate. It's also not difficult to like both of them, though I suppose one may stir a sense of admiration while the other is more a figure to be pitied. Overall, Sliding Doors is an entertaining movie that makes you think about the road not taken - and whether it really matters.