- From first-time writer-director John Hindman, comes The Answer Man, a romantic comedy starring Jeff Daniels (The Squid and the Whale) and Lauren Graham (Gilmore Girls) about love and the search for meaning. Arlen Faber (Daniels) is the reclusive and misanthropic author of "Me and God," a book that has redefined spirituality for an entire generation and has been translated into over 100 languages.
Arlen Faber (Jeff Daniels) is the
reclusive author of Me and God, a
book that has redefined spirituality for an entire generation and has been translated into over 100 languages. On the eve of the 20th anniversary of his still wildly popular book, Arlen is still sought after as the man who has all the answers. Arlen's life collides with Elizabeth (Lauren Graham), a single mom raising her seven-year-old son, and Kris (Lou Taylor Pucci), a young man fresh out of rehab who is searching for meaning! . Both Elizabeth and Kris are hopeful that Arlen has the answers, but the truth is, he hasn't got a clue.Jeff Daniels shines as a know-it-all who really doesn't in
The Answer Man, a 2009 romantic comedy whose predictability does very little to detract from its overall charm. Daniels plays Arlen Faber, author of
Me and God, a mega-selling tome in which he asks some tough existential questions ("Does prayer work?" "I don't believe in you. Now what?"), with the answers allegedly dictated by the Almighty himself. The book led to numerous spinoffs (
The Me and God Diet, anyone?), but as the 20th anniversary of its publication nears, Faber is a reclusive misanthrope who tosses fan mail aside without a glance, swears a lot, and utters pithy aphorisms that are a good deal less charitable than before ("Hell is other people"). He also has a back problem, which one day brings him to chiropractor Elizabeth (Lauren Graham), a single mom who works wonders on Arlen's s! pine but, amazingly, has never heard of him; she in turn buys ! the book at a shop owned by Kris (Lou Taylor Pucci), who's just out of alcohol rehab and about to lose his store to his many creditors. That the lives of these three, especially Arlen and Elizabeth (as well as her winning young son), will soon become intertwined is hardly a revelation; nor is the fact that Arlen, for all his wisdom, is a self-conscious doofus who can barely express his own feelings. But writer-director John Hindman's screenplay has some excellent dialogue, and while some of the situations are overly silly and facile, Hindman goes easy on the more cutesy and cloying aspects (an ongoing bit involving Ella Fitzgerald's recording of "Isn't It Romantic" is most amusing). It's not
As Good as It Gets, but
The Answer Man is just fine.
--Sam Graham
