In a screenplay by Jake Paltrow, sister Gwyneth plays shrew of a wife Dora who so distresses her hubby Gary (Martin Freeman) that he recedes into a world of dreams. The dreams center around the perfect woman, Anna (Penйlope Cruz—“Volver,” “All the Pretty Horses”), a combination of a Siren of Titan and the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Barricading himself into his New York apartment, Gary can’t live with her and he can’t live without her.
As Anna comes to life in the form of a high fashion model whose bus-poster presence haunts Gary daily, he can’t decide whether he is asleep or awake. In fact, he can’t decide if he wants to know the difference. It’s a lucky break for Gary, and even luckier for the audience, when Danny DeVito shows up to help out.
As Gary cultivates his ability to live in a dream world, slowly, and hilariously, covering his entire apartment with sound-deadening material to block out the unblockable sounds of New York, he attends classes by the dream master himself, Mel (DeVito). Danny DeVito has reached the point in his life where he only has to take the best parts in the best screenplays. He chooses his parts with care and seems to be showing up in the most quirky and lowest budget efforts.
Like Wayne the Pool Guy showing Parker Posey the way to sexual fulfillment (“The Oh in Ohio”) he is the key to Gary’s limited success in the dream department. As Gary plasters sound deadening cotton and foam from wall to wall, Mel continues to grease the skids to lunacy as only the master can do. Whereas Gary seems to be failing in everything he does, his pal and ex-band mate Paul (Simon Pegg) is doing better all the time.
As Paul lands contract after ever-richer contract Gary is reduced to plunking piano keys looking for the lowest common denominator in advertising jingles. Freeman affects a very funny deer-in-the-headlights sophistication that works well onscreen with Pegg. He is able to be the urban sophisticate and the confused walking-wounded male at the same time.
Close friends in real life, Freeman and Pegg have a strong on-screen chemistry that makes this film fun. But part of that chemistry is the fun of seeing Pegg finally move beyond the clownish roles he had in “Shawn of the Dead” and his recent “Hot Fuzz.” Not that there is anything wrong with those films, they were good hearted attempts at fresh humor.
But seeing a more serious side to Pegg opens up powerful possibilities. He has mastered slapstick, or come close enough. Now let’s see what else he can do.
In fact, he makes a great sophomore sophisticate, constantly missing the point of his friend’s distress while naively twisting the dagger of his own unintended success. He is hugely successful and blissfully unaware of how lame he is, at the same time. Director of Photography Giles Nuttgens had a challenging task in delineating the frequent breaks between Gary’s real life and his dream world.
The solution was to shoot the real life scenes in Super 16mm film and the dream scenes in finer grained and more colorful 35mm stock. The end result is a “Wizard of Oz” effect that puts the harsh realities of real life in a perspective of graininess and washed out potentials whereas the dream world is soft and colorful. A cheap solution to a potentially expensive problem that met the budgetary goals of relative newcomer writer/director Paltrow.
In the end this film is clever and does the right thing. If there is little new here, perhaps it paves the way for a bright future for Jake Paltrow.
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