Stranger than Fiction

Another film I have enjoyed this fall, Stranger than Fiction, follows a writer character named Kay Eiffel, played by Emma Thompson, as she attempts to write the tragedy of a Will Ferrell character named Harold Crick. But Crick inadvertently gains self awareness as a character being manipulated by a writer with a death wish. This self-reflexive film reminds me of At Swim-Two-Birds, Flann O'Brien's tour-de-force on the "opposite and equal reaction" of characters upon their authors. Dustin Hoffman plays a very funny, very satiric, English professor who attempts to help Crick identify the type of story he is in. It is only when Crick accepts that he is in a tragedy that Eiffel wakes up to the possibility of a story not ending in the death of the main character. The playfulness with genres is delightful. And the implications of what makes for more profound literature--tragedy or comedy--and more profound living are truly . . . well . . . profound.