2007 DVD Review: Lars and the Real Girl

I've seen my fair share of Indie Quirkfests, but this is my first encounter with an Indie Serious Dissociative Disorderfest. For a good portion of this movie, I was thinking "gimmeafuckinbreak," what with the whimsical notion of a whole town full of people cheerfully humoring a clinically insane loner played by Ryan Gosling by pretending his life-sized sex doll is a real person. But as the conceit grew comically over the top (the townspeople elect the sex doll to the school board! they drive her to the hospital in an ambulance when Gosling says she's 'sick!'), it dawned on my that, while the Nerf-coated magical community of the film is ludicrious, it's supposed to be ludicrious. By making the town comically accomodating, the filmmakers are tipping their hand that the film is a parable about the pain, fear, joy and transcendence inherent in a lone person reaching out to the world to make a connection. Sure, no real town would give an obvious nutjob that kind of latitude, and there sure as hell wouldn't be an understanding young woman just waiting for said nutjob to dump his plastic girfriend and take her out to dance, but these moments are still poignant. Lars' delusions, the understanding of the townsfolk, these things are oversized representations of relatable phenomena. Who hasn't felt a kernal of Lar's discomfort and fear in trying to forge relationships? And who hasn't been encouraged in their journey towards those relationships by the disarming kindness of our friends, family, and occasional stranger?