Fool's Paradise

Charlie Day stars in a self written and directed film that captures the comedy and physicality of old silent film stars like Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin. In a story that beautifully captures Hollywood commentary in a fun and lighthearted way. The film picks a style and tone long dead and reawakens it. Fool’s Paradise is a fun and entertaining film that makes Charlie Day shine.

Now on rare occasions does an actor starring, writing and directing a movie actually work. The most notable artist that has tried is Woody Allen and though he is a bad person he is a great filmmaker. When you don’t see yourself on film, or you have a hard time articulating what you would like to see on film it's important to create opportunities for yourself. Charlie Day’s investment in himself really pays off here. Giving himself very little dialogue allowed him to play to his strengths, his physical comedy. Taking obvious inspiration from the greats, Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, Charlie Day uses his amazing physicality and great facial expressions to tell the story of a man that can’t seem to understand the world around him and therefore is very suggestable. This leads him into the foreign world of Hollywood.

Here is where the film starts its commentary on Hollywood. When Latte Pronto replaces the star of a film we start to see how Hollywood treats everyone as expendable. This point is hammered home when Latte’s stand-in takes over the time and attention from his agency and management team. This first bit of commentary was not subtle and it plays really well. Not only is it reality but it's also mixed with a little bit of saying that you can fall as quickly and easily as you can rise in Hollywood. A sad point that is also true. Hollywood is a fickle industry and being a nameless, faceless figure is a lot more common and accurate then being an A list celebrity.

The second piece of commentary that I really loved is how the media surrounding the film industry likes to exaggerate and twist things. Latte is basically just swept up into these unfavorable situations. And as he ends up in the middle somehow the media turns it into him being the instigator and core problem of these situations. And he can not speak up for himself. The media really defines who he is, as do other people’s reactions. This is great because generally speaking in Hollywood if you are caught up in tabloids or rumors get out, that defines who you are regardless of the validity of the claims.

I say this a lot but run times will always be a point of discussion for me, the film being an hour and half was great. It told a good story without dragging the concept out for too long. There are many filmmakers that would have takes the exact same concept and made it a needless 2-3 hour film.

Overall I think the film was enjoyable. Coming in at a tight hour and a half it told the story that it wanted to tell without being self indulgent and verbose. It had great commentary without being heavy handed and it allowed for great actors to play into their strengths. I would give the film a 7/10. It’s not a work of brilliance but it knew what it was and it didn’t try to be anything else. It had the charm and feeling of old silent films while balancing the comedy of today and for that it deserves some praise. It cuts through the noise of most comedy films made now by giving the audience another option. It was a good film that I would definitely see again.