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The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Starring Ben Stiller, Kristen Wiig, Patton Oswalt, Adam Scott and Sean Penn. Directed by Ben Stiller. 114 minutes. Opens Dec. 25 at major theatres. PG
Like any cubical jockey who has stared into space and daydreamed a perfect plot of heroism and greatness — starring them — Ben Stiller[1] has put himself both at the helm and in nearly every scene of The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.
If you love the Zoolander star and don’t mind that this movie generates the occasional weak smile rather than huge laughs, then this self-indulgent, CGI-heavy Stiller world tour will make you happy indeed.
Mitty was the central character of the 1947 fantasy starring Danny Kaye[2] , based on the very brief James Thurber[3] -penned short story in The New Yorker; the name has become synonymous with dreamers of this world.
Now Stiller takes on the tale, directing from a script by Steve Conrad (The Pursuit of Happyness, The Weather Man). He updates it in sort-of fashion with reclusive Mitty, now a bachelor, toiling in the decidedly archaic photo negative department of Life magazine[4] . How Mitty has lasted this long on the job in the age of digital photography is a mystery.
(In real life, the photo-news magazine struggled to stay on newsstands in various forms, finally folding in 2007.)
Mitty often “disappears,” to be discovered staring into space while conjuring up acts of invented heroism, often inspired by the giant (fabricated) Life covers that line the office walls.
Risking his skin in his daydreams is a good antidote for the real danger lurking in the magazine’s halls. Corporate hatchetmen (led by a snide Adam Scott[5] ) have landed and are showing much of the staff the door as Life is repurposed as a web-only publication.
Mitty’s daydreams are also sparked by his secret crush on co-worker, Cheryl (a pleasingly low-key Kristen Wiig[6] ). Too shy to attempt a workplace meeting, he’s opted for eHarmony to get her attention but he spends more time chatting with the dating site’s online troubleshooter Todd (an ill-used Patton Oswalt) than Cheryl.
When the real world disappoints, dreaming takes over. In a flash, the coffee room at work falls away as Mitty swaps his nerdy, putty-coloured windbreaker for vibrant mountain climbing gear and a handsomely ice-covered beard to woo Cheryl by fantastic means. But the exercise is without heart or genuine emotion, a missing element that constantly niggles as the film progresses.
With the final issue of Life about to go into production, Mitty has been tasked with printing the cover photo from a negative sent by reclusive and rebellious superstar photographer and perpetual globetrotter, Sean O’Connell (Sean Penn).
But the precious negative has gone missing and finding it is the only thing standing between Mitty and a layoff notice.
Soon Mitty’s daydreams of feats like asphalt surfing down Manhattan streets morph into real feats of crazed heroics involving helicopters, sharks, Afghanistan mountain treks, volcanoes and skateboard racing along an Icelandic highway as he tries to track down O’Connell and that precious final frame.
The calculated layering of adventures and heroics, all involving long frame-filling close-ups of Mitty looking pensive or wide-eyed, show a variety of computer-generated splendours that don’t seem to be in service of anything. A The Curious Case of Benjamin Button[7] gag is the most obvious example, dropped in for no other reason than to show it can be done.
Stiller’s relentless focus on his own character leaves others poorly realized and the heart of the story pales amid the spectacle. Deeper messages than chasing your dreams are lost to the slick, ad campaign-style bigness of the pursuit.
References
- ^ Ben Stiller (www.imdb.com)
- ^ 1947 fantasy starring Danny Kaye (www.imdb.com)
- ^ James Thurber (www.biography.com)
- ^ Life magazine (life.time.com)
- ^ Adam Scott (www.imdb.com)
- ^ Kristen Wiig (www.imdb.com)
- ^ The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (www.imdb.com)
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