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Comedy depends on the unexpected, and perhaps no one
illustrates this better than Will Ferrell. After ignoring his work on Saturday Night Live and
barely noticing his switch to film, I was surprised by the number of movies
he stole in minor roles. Ferrell can easily match the buffoonery of Jim
Carrey and Adam Sandler, but, unlike his main rivals, he varies his comedy
roles. The current hit Blades
of Glory offers a much less sympathetic
Ferrell character, an obnoxious, womanizing championship ice skater. His
rivalry with another champion (Jon Heder) leads first to permanent
suspension and then to an unlikely male-male pairing. Ferrell and Heder
glide through the silly plot. Blades of Glory is no great advancement for Ferrell, but it is a
worthy addition to his comic filmography. One shouldn’t have to wait for the holidays to
enjoy Ferrell’s first solo starring role, in the Christmas fantasy Elf (2003). Ferrell is a
human raised as an elf by Santa and his helpers. Realizing that he is too
large for the workshop, he ventures to New York to find his real father
(James Caan). Ferrell’s clownish behavior works perfectly in the
context of this ridiculous story. After the misfires of Anchorman:
The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004) and Bewitched (2005) and the
likeable but minor Kicking & Screaming (2005), Ferrell recharged his career with Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby (2006). NASCAR is a natural, but overlooked, target for ridicule, and
Ferrell runs with it as a dimwitted racing legend. Ricky Bobby presides
over the perfect Red State family, a shrewish wife and two monstrous sons,
hilariously named Walker and Texas Ranger.
Ferrell aspires to a higher level as an actor, and he
achieved greatness rather quickly with one of last year’s best films,
Stranger Than Fiction. Ferrell is a bland IRS auditor who discovers that he is a
character in a novel after hearing the voice of the writer (Emma Thompson)
in his head. At the emotional core is a romantic subplot with Maggie
Gyllenhaal that in its short amount of screen time yields the best love
story in recent memory. Stranger Than Fiction is a quirky tale that never loosens its intriguing grip.
Ferrell has proved that he is an actor, first and foremost.
New on DVD this Tuesday (April 17): Notes on a Scandal, Smokin’ Aces,
The Last King of Scotland,
Freedom Writers, and The History Boys.
This article appears in Apr 12-18, 2007.
