The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (****)
Directed by: Ben Stiller
Starring: Ben Stiller, Kristen Wiig,
Shirley MacLaine, Adam Scott, Sean Penn, Kathryn Hann, Patton Oswalt, Adrian
Martinez
Seen: January 3rd 2014
**** Out of ****
When I walked out of the cinema after
watching The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, my first movie for 2014, my thoughts
were that I would not see a movie that I will enjoy more for the rest of the
year. As I now write this review almost two months later (catching up), that
thought still stands; The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is one of my all-time
favourite movies. It is visually striking and inventive, and it is funny and
heartfelt all at the same time, connecting with the viewer on a deeper level.
Walter Mitty (Stiller) is a negative
assets manager (smart talk for the guy who sits in a hidden office and manages
the negatives photographers submit) at Life magazine. He has vividly real
daydreams that range from him sweeping the girl he is secretly in love with, his
Life colleague Cheryl, off her feet; to superhero style fights with his new
boss Ted Hendricks (Scott). Hendricks is there to oversee the transition of
Life magazine from print to an online presence, and he is absolutely terrible
at almost exactly what George Clooney's Ryan Bingham was so great at in Up in
the Air; he has to fire people. It's not that he can't do it either, he loves
it, but he is just a complete ass about it, and has no compassion for the
people whose lives he is there to destroy. Walter receives a package from
Life's award winning photographer Sean O'Connell (Penn), with a promise that it
contains his best photo yet, the photo they should use for the cover of the last
print issue of Life magazine.
The negative is however missing from
the package, and Walter must stall Hendricks and figure out how to get in
contact with the cell-phone-less and adventure seeking O'Connell to get the
negative. Initially Walter is uncertain of what to do, but then, after actually
meeting Cheryl and talking with her, he decides to take the risk and go after
O'Connell. Using the other negatives in the package he received from O'Connell,
Walter deduces that he might be in Greenland, and he flies there to start his
search. This is merely the start of one of the most heartfelt movies I've seen
in a very long time, and what follows is a fantastic flight of adventure, as
Walter slowly but certainly starts living not in his vivid daydreams, but on
his own. The travels are inspiring, and Walter's transformation into a new
person is uplifting.
The movie is visually truly enjoyable, from the way cell-phone
messages are displayed to the extreme daydreams Walter experiences. My personal
favourite highlight of the movie is the singing of David Bowie's Space Oddity –
"Ground control to Major Tom..." by Kristen Wiig, it's awesome. Ben
Stiller has truly crafted a brilliant movie that will take every viewer along
on the fantastic daydreams and true travels of Walter in his pursuit of the
elusive O'Connell. The movie brilliantly doesn't do a bait-and-switch by not
actually revealing the photo eventually (they could have left that to the
viewers' imagination, showing only the characters' adoring faces), and I loved
this, as the photo was really incredible in the context of the story.
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