Is 'Lars and the Real Girl' real Globes and Oscars fare?
Last year Ryan Gosling received lots of kudos love for his work as a drug-addicted teacher in "Half Nelson." This year he plays another kind of loser — a social misfit who falls in love with, of all things, an inflatable doll in "Lars and the Real Girl." Canvassing 30 reviews, Rotten Tomatoes gives the offbeat comedy a score of 76 with a cream of the crop rating of 83 while over at Meta Critic, the aggregate of 11 reviews is a less impressive 62. For Gosling to repeat as a best actor contender, he will need the support of key critics, some of whom found the film lacking.
Among those most impressed was Jan Stuart of Newsday who writes, "This could be a one-note sex joke waiting to happen, but Dane Cook and Ben Stiller (who would be on the fast track for such an assignment) apparently have other fish to fry. Thankfully, the idea has sprung from the authentic imagination of 'Six Feet Under' writer Nancy Oliver, making her feature film debut, and has landed in the lap of Ryan Gosling, one of the most sensitive and capable actors of his generation. Gentled along by director Craig Gillespie, the collaboration yields a life-sized miracle of a movie, an eccentrically funny and affecting ode to the power of love and community spirit."
Kenneth Turan of The Los Angeles Times says, "this is a film whose daring and delicate blend of apparent irreconcilables will sweep you off your feet if you're not careful. For what screenwriter Nancy Oliver, director Craig Gillespie and a top cast have done is construct a Frank Capra-style fable, a throwback tribute to the joys of friendship and community, around a sex toy. Taking one of the most salacious items modern culture can provide as their centerpiece, they've created the sweetest, most innocent, most completely enjoyable film around. First among equals is Gosling, who plays the sweet, guileless and very much removed Lars with unwavering, unblinking sincerity."
Claudia Puig of USA Today writes, "At a time when romantic comedies seem to have exhausted unique ideas, along comes Lars, an original, amusing and heartfelt tale sharply written by Nancy Oliver (Six Feet Under). Ryan Gosling continues to demonstrate his impressive range as Lars Lindstrom, a painfully shy young man with a boring office job. When not working, he's reclusive, emerging only weekly to attend church services. Though well-meaning, he recoils from human contact, declining even the invitations of his well-intentioned sister-in-law (Emily Mortimer) and brother (Paul Schneider). Gosling poignantly embodies the awkward Lars with signature gestures (a repeated blinking feels particularly authentic), bringing his sweet-natured character to vivid life."
Joe Morgenstern of The Wall Street Journal enthuses about, "an almost perfect movie with flawless performances. Ryan Gosling has done extraordinary work before, most notably in 'The Believer' and 'Half Nelson,' but the comic sensibility he unleashes here still comes as a surprise. The leash is short, and taut. You can't even call what he does deadpan, for that would suggest some hint of self-comment. His Lars is simply rooted in every moment, though that doesn't quite get at the actor's art either. There's nothing simple about Lars's fantasy life with Bianca, or his response to being touched by a therapist, physically and emotionally, in one of the best therapy sequences you've ever seen. Just as that life with Bianca grows out of need, as the therapist explains to his family (with hardly a syllable of psychobabble), Mr. Gosling's portrayal grows out of judgment-free revelation; he lets us in on the safe, sweet pleasure Lars takes from his ostensibly inanimate inamorata."
Lou Lumenick of the New York Post says that the plot, "might sound pretty creepy on paper, but it doesn't seem smarmy at all on the screen, thanks to a completely straight performance by Gosling, who has demonstrated his extreme versatility in films such as 'Half Nelson' (netting an Oscar nomination as an addicted teacher) and the four-handkerchief 'The Notebook.' The script by 'Six Feet Under' writer Nancy Oliver eschews cheap laughs for character-driven humanist comedy, and is sensitively directed by Craig Gillespie (whose recent debut film, the abominable "Mr. Woodcock," was taken out of his hands). It's a tribute to the filmmakers and cast that by the end of "Lars and the Real Girl," you can almost accept that Bianca is, well, a real girl.
While Alissa Simon of Variety says, "Helmer Craig Gillespie's sweetly off-kilter film plays like a Coen brothers riff on Garrison Keillor's 'Lake Woebegon' tales, defying its lurid premise with a gentle comic drama grounded in reality," Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly was less than impressed. She says, "I think we put up with Lars at all only because Gosling has such an affinity for the wounded boy birds he tends to play that it's easy to watch him do his thing. He treats his silicone costar with great gentleness. But even his mad skills at embodying misfit masculinity can't sustain the plastic premise."
Manohla Dargis of The New York Times was particularly vehement in her dislike of the movie, calling it, "a palatable audience bait of average accomplishment that superficially recalls the plain style of Alexander Payne, but without any of the lacerating edges or moral ambiguity. Lars’s anguish has nothing to do with the loneliness of small towns or alienation in the modern world or even real pain; unlike the characters in Mr. Payne’s films, he suffers without disquieting fuss or messy fluids. His infatuation with Bianca inspires clucks of sympathy and a little confusion, but the priest smiles indulgently, as do the old ladies." As for Gosling, she says, "the performance is a rare miscalculation in a mostly brilliant career. Lars is a difficult, maybe impossible character, a holy fool and a martyr in waiting, a subject of mockery and a means of redemption. With his awkward manner and solitary habits, he comes across as more stunted than damaged, soft rather than hurt. Mr. Gosling smiles his goofy smile and begs for attention, but he never fills this conceit with life. Lars too is a doll, as pliable as Bianca and just as phony."
