Although it wasn't my first choice I was sufficiently intrigued by The Invention of Lying to think it might be a worthwhile night at the pictures. Reviews had been mixed but the premise was intriguing.
The film allegedly does what it says on the tin; Ricky Gervais is the man who invents a lie in a world where everyone tells the truth. Except that it's not really; this appears to be set in a world where people are so naive they believe everything they are told which is an entirely different prospect.
The film lost me about ten minutes in, after it had expended all of the predictable blunt spoken gags. After that it became an exercise in deconstruction to try to work out just how awful it is and where it goes wrong; the answers are 'very' and 'everywhere'.
Let's leave aside the notion that Ricky Gervais is a very limited actor - this character, as are all his others, is a retread of David Brent and Andy Millman - but whatever appeal he has is limited to the small screen. Projected on a big screen he is a charisma vacuum leaving a large hole where his character ought to be. Let's hear it for co-stars Jennifer Garner and Rob Lowe who do what stars are supposed to do and twinkle as if their lives depend on it.
The frustrating thing about the film is that it has the potential to be a very powerful satire but bottles it in the end. Gervais seems to be making a point about organised religion when one of his fabrications - the only well-intentioned one - becomes an article of faith for a desperate populace. How sad are their lives when they latch on to this one shred of hope, an interesting point which isn't explored.
Incidentally only when Gervais becomes the new Messiah do the people start to question things. Why don't they just accept what he tells them as they do in every other part of the film.
The notion of religion being the ultimate lie is similarly intriguing but it is discarded without much examination once it has served Gervais's short term comic purpose. Rather than explore this issue we go for a sappy rom-com ending which relies on almost everything we have seen before being turned on its head.
However given this film's capacity for somersaults that should come as no surprise.
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1 comment:
Now that I know something about The Invention Of Lying, I want to see it far less than when I knew nothing.
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