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    		•

    FILMS

    Wonderboys (2000)
  • Starring Michael Douglas, Tobey Maguire, Frances McDormand, Robert Downey Jr., Katie Holmes, Rip Torn, Richard Thomas

  • Directed by Curtis Hanson

    • I'll be very up front with you on this review. I love this movie. Let me say that again for those of you not paying attention: I love this movie. A lot. Absolutely and without hesitation. There is not one frame of this film that I don't enjoy. I'm not even sure if I have any real critical faculties when it comes to Wonder Boys. You cannot trust me to be unbiased, because I have no intention or desire to be so. I'm borderline fanboy on this one, kids. So, consider yourself warned: this review will be dripping from the maw.

    Grady Tripp (Douglas) is a college fiction professor who seven years ago wrote a PEN-award-winning novel, The Arsonists Daughter, but since then ... well, he's been unable to get to the end of his current book. But he keeps writing and the book becomes gigantic. But the ending keeps getting farther away from him. And his wife just left him this morning. James Leer (Maguire) is one of Tripp's students who is troubled and confused and sad about pretty much everything. Except writing. When it comes to the written word, he's incredible. Terry Crabtree (Downey) is Tripp's sexually-excitable editor who is visiting for the college's annual writer gab-a-thon "WordFest." And, he hopes to see Tripp's novel—which Tripp is guarding like gold. Sara Gaskell (McDormand) is the Chancellor of the college and she's having an affair with Tripp, which makes things difficult because she's married to Walter Gaskell (Thomas), the Marilyn Monroe/Joe DiMaggio memorabilia-obsessed collector head of the English Department—which makes him Tripp's boss. Hannah Green (Holmes) rents a room from Tripp, is one of his students, compulsively wears red cowboy boots, and has a crush on her professor-landlord. Quentin Moorewood (Torn), known affectionately as Q, is the writer that every writer hates. He's nice, prolific, knowledgeable, well-spoken, and agreeable. He's the guest of honor for WordFest.

    Ultimately, this film is about choices. The characters' choices and the consequences that follow. Many of the characters in this movie are at a crossroads, of sorts, in their lives and must find their own way. Well, to be honest, "crossroads" may not cut it. More like "huge canyon." And even if they make a decision to get to the other side, there's always the problem of "how." So, this film is also about bridges—metaphorical ones of course—getting from where you are to where you want, or more importantly need to be. When watching Wonder Boys try and be very aware of this fact—bridges are everywhere in the film. They're quietly lurking in the background in a lot of scenes. A picture behind Tripp and Crabtree in the airport; Q's WordFest speech; and Pittsburgh itself is a city of bridges, of which the characters drive over many times.

    One of my favorite things about Wonder Boys is that every character is a character. Everyone in the story has some sort of quirk or eccentricity that makes the film a lot of fun. Tripp's pink writing bathrobe; Crabtree's narcotics; Hannah's boots, James' living situation; Walter's Monroe and DiMaggio interests; Sara's greenhouse; Vernon Hardapple's motive for hoodjumping. Even tertiary characters, like Q who only has but a few lines, is memorable. When walking out of a bar with the rest of the group, who is carrying an extremely drunk (and quite possibly drugged) James Leer, Q says, "What that boy needs is a nice, tall glass of Coca-Cola." I'm not exactly sure why this line strikes me, but it does. There's a type of naivete that is both genuine and endearing, and Q brings that across.

    If I'm going to be truly honest, though, I'd have to say that the main appeal to me about Wonder Boys is that it's about writing. If you're not a writer then, perhaps, this film won't mean as much. However, I am a writer. So, for me, this film was more than just a comedy of errors. It was about something. More than that, it was about something important.

    Above I mentioned choices. As a writer sometimes you're forced to push everything aside for the sake of the words and the writing. Family, friends, problems—shove it all into a closet and lock them away for a bit, so you can focus on the writing. But it's a fine line most writers walk. A writer who does this too often will find his friends gone and his family distant. A writer who does this too infrequently will find that he's not writing, and he'll become stagnant and depressed and possibly blocked. Tripp comes to realize that he's pushed too many people away for too long when, after explaining how busy he's been to his ex-wife's father, the father says, "Ah yes, the book. I hope it's really good, Grady." That about sums it up for Tripp. How good can that book be to justify his wife leaving him, and neglecting most things in his life? Even if was a best-seller, his wife would still be gone. She'd still be hurt. Of course, Tripp overcompensates after this by declaring that books don't mean anything to anyone.

    This, of course, is not true. It's just that they don't mean everything to everybody. A hard lesson for Grady Tripp to learn, but one to which I could very closely associate.

    I'm sure this film has flaws. It's got to. Nothing's perfect. But, like someone may overlook a good friend's bad habits or a lover's imperfections, I tend to overlook this film's flaws, to the point where I can no longer see them.