#027 - Brief Interviews With Hideous Men (2009)

Director: John Krasinski

Writer: John Krasinski (from story by David Foster Wallace)

Runtime: 80 min

I have to admit, I've never read anything by David Foster Wallace, which probably puts me a little bit behind the 8 ball on my perception of the movie. But from what I've read, it seems like it was a difficult book to try and make into a movie, seeing as it contained fairly disparate stories from many sources. Well, it turns out, maybe it didn't make for the best movie idea.

I'm a huge fan of John Krasinski, really, I mean it's hard for me to separate the actor from the character Jim Halpert, but from what I've seen, he's a very intelligent guy with a lot of interest across the board in the arts. Thus, his bold attempt to adapt this collection of stories to the big screen. And I applaud the effort, but to be honest, it seems a little bit like he was trying to do too much, trying to be a little too fancy. The first 60 minutes of this short feature are slow and without much pop. The lead actress, Julianne Nicholson (playing Sara Quinn), has perfected the doe-eyed expression, but she hardly does anything in the movie, hardly even speaks. She does a lot of sitting and looking out of windows, she always seems to be caught off guard lost in thought (whenever anyone addresses her, she has to snap out of her own world--"Sorry, what?"). Perhaps that's exactly what she's supposed to do, but it just doesn't make the story very compelling. I knew going into it that the plot of the film (a graduate student interviews men as a result of a breakup) but without that prior knowledge it would have been a little difficult to pick up on it.

Towards the end, the impetus of the story comes to light a little bit, a valiant attempt to redeem itself, as Krasinski himself sits in front of Sara and explains to her the heartbreaking revelation he experienced while cheating on her. As far as movie monologues go, Krasinski turned in a decent one, but the story he tells, while moving, is kind of contradictory and exploitative, and just left me with a bit of an unsettled feeling--like I was missing the point.

I hate to be so negative about a movie, I really do, but after all was said and done I'm not sure I found a lot to take from it. Some of the interviews were charming and interesting, particularly one by an aging African-American man (Frankie Faison) who tells about his workaholic and socially underappreciated father (Malcolm Goodwin). But aside from those vignettes, the main thread of the film was fairly imprecise. It was not a failure, necessarily--a good first feature on the other side of the camera for Krasinski, but it wasn't terrific either. As a side note, Ben Gibbard (of Death Cab and Postal Service fame) makes an appearance as a friend in the film, and while I appreciate the man's many musical talents, he had a really weird on screen presence. I'm not totally excited for his next role.