Brief Interviews with Hideous Men (Friday, September, 25, 2009) (132)

I've owned the book of 'Brief Interviews with Hideous Men' for about five years now, but have never read it^1. David Forster Wallace wrote in a neo-gonzo style that is non-linear and includes many different narration styles and, of course, lots of footnotes. I think it would be difficult, to say the least, to make a movie that moderately represented one of his books^2.

The film was the passion project of John Krasinski who adapted to book for screen, directed and acted in it. He shows himself to be a very clever filmmaker - and though the movie is not entirely successful, it is, I think, probably as close to David Foster Wallace as one could get on screen.

I'll try to explain the jumbled story - but having never read the book, if I get it wrong, forgive me, as I'm just trying to tell the story as I understood it. Basically, the movie focuses on Sara^3, a grad student who interviews men about their sexual fetishes, hang-ups and desires. She seems to be getting over a sexual relationship of her own. She is a totally beautiful woman who attracts a lot of male attention and has to deal with this as she works on her research and her relationship fall-out.

The structure of the film has a parade of 'hideous' men speaking to Sara interview-style (in a university research office) about their sexuality. Some are brief and some are more long-winded. The men are played by a line of known actors of the moment (Will Forte, Will Arnett, Domonic Cooper, Bobby Cannavale, Frankie Faison and Clarke Peters - who is strangely uncredited)^4. Cut in between these moments are small scenes of Sara's life. Overall this format is effective for understanding the non-linear structure of the book - though, at times, the plot is slightly opaque.

Sadly much of the dialogue in the film feels fake and stagey. It's hard to say if it's the writing or the direction, but there are moments when the actors sound as if they're in a high school play reciting lines, rather than actually acting. Krasinski is the worst culprit as his monologue in the last act is really not very good at all^5.

I do give Krasinski a ton of credit for taking a book that must be incredibly difficult to understand and turn it into a movie that generally makes sense. It's interesting, once you figure out what is going on, and generally not a bad effort^6. It's not something to rush out to see, but it is pretty good.

Stars: 2 of 4

^1 I think I picked it up on a 'free giveaway' table in and old apartment building. I think I thought I liked the cover and I knew of DFW, but had never read anything he wrote. I think at the time I knew that he was incredibly difficult to understand.

^2 After not reading Interviews, I've actually read another book and a few Harpers articles by DFW and have really enjoyed all of them. I recently tried again to read Interviews, but it is really difficult. Maybe I'll make this a resolution to get through soon.

^3 Sara is played by Julianne Nicholson who is absolutely gorgeous. It's silly to comment on how beautiful she is, but she is really very beautiful. For me, the idea of telling her my sexual hang-ups is both compelling and frightening because she is so beautiful. I don't know if this was done on purpose, but I assume it was - and for that I commend Krasinski and the casting director.

^4 It seems like the male cast of Saturday Night Live and The Wire were raided for the cast. There's nothing wrong with this - it's just amusing. These performances are generally very good.

^5 I'm not totally sure if this is a comment on Krasinski's acting chops in general or just his dramatic acting chops - or just simply that his script and direction were not good- but that in different circumstances, he would be good. But he was not good here. And I normally think he's very funny in The Office and was good enough in Away we Go from this past summer.

^6 I actually really like that there's a scene right at the end where Sara talks about her research and explains exactly what the whole point of the movie is. It's a clever bit of writing and very effective - and I could imagine DFW writing something like this. After winding your way through the whole tale - the point of the story is handed to you at the end. Of course, I've never read the book, so I don't even know if this is Krasinski or DFW.