One morning, a seemingly average and generally solitary IRS agent named Harold Crick begins to hear a female voice narrating his every action, thought and feeling in alarmingly precise detail. Harold's carefully controlled life is turned upside down by this narration only he can hear, and when the voice declares that Harold Crick is facing imminent death, he realizes he must find out who is writing his story and persuade her to change the ending. The voice in Harold's head turns out to be the once celebrated, but now nearly forgotten, novelist Karen "Kay" Eiffel, who is struggling to find an ending for what might be her best book. Her only remaining challenge is to figure out a way to kill her main character, but little does she know that Harold Crick is alive and well and inexplicably aware of her words and her plans for him.

To make matters worse, Kay's publisher has dispatched a hard-nosed "assistant," Penny Escher, to force Kay to finish her novel and finish off Harold Crick. Desperate to take control of his destiny and avoid an untimely demise, Harold seeks help from a literary theorist named Jules Hilbert, who suggests that Harold might be able to change his fate by turning his story from a tragedy into a comedy. Professor Hilbert suggests that Harold try to follow one of comedy's most elemental formulas: a love story between two people who hate each other. His suggestion leads Harold to initiate an unlikely romance with a free-spirited baker named Ana Pascal. As Harold experiences true love and true life for the first time, he becomes convinced that he has escaped his fate, as his story seems to be taking on all the trappings of a comedy in which he will not, and cannot, die. But Harold is unaware that in a Karen Eiffel tragedy, the lead characters always die at exactly the moment when they have the most to live for.

I think any actor who has had a long stint as a comedic performer eventually begins to think about stretching their acting skills and doing something more complicated that the traditional comedy they are so well known for. We saw it from actors like Tom Hanks and Robin Williams to Jim Carrey and know it looks like Will Ferrell is trying to make that same more from comedy to drama. In some cases the move is very successful (eg. Tom Hanks) and in others not so much (eg. Jim Carrey who has still never escaped his slapstick persona). The best way to make sure that you will be accepted as something other than a comedian is to pick a movie and a roll that are very well written and that will showcase you acting skills at their very best and Will Ferrell has done just that as he is perfect for his role in Stranger than Fiction. What this translates into is a very enjoyable movie that you will find yourself completely enthralled by starring an actor in a role that is completely different than anything he has done in a very long time. It also translated into a movie that could be considered on of the best of the year as it was highly imaginative and had a story that completely drew you in.

Once you get past the strangeness of seeing Ferrell out of character for anything he has ever done you come to realize why many consider him very funny. I personally have never truly like Ferrell but after seeing Stranger than Fiction I have come to realize while he may act utterly silly at times in his movie there is a method to his madness. He has this subtle undertow to his films that aren't completely apparent at the time you see his movies but come more and more apparent after you have seen him in many movies. He plays the role of Harold Crick with such a monotone like performance that seems to fit the feel of the movie so well you come to realize it could have only been done on purpose. Although at times I had to wonder if they were trying to hard as there were several completely inexplicable scenes that made no sense with the rest of the movie. The first being a shower scene that made you think out loud what the heck is this all about and too them trying to throw you off the trail too much.

The movie is very well written and very smart though there are more than a few moments where you can't but help think of how smart the screenwriters were to think of something like that. The movie is a refreshing change from the constant barrage of movies that aren't so well written and aren't so character driven. The rest of the cast also puts in excellent performance from Maggie Gyllenhaal as the girl Ferrell obsesses over to Emma Thompson who narrates most of the movie. The movie went beyond any expectations that I had for it, as it was so clever I couldn't but help my self from laughing, emphasizing and being drawn into the movie completely.d will be remembered because of him and is a fun, intense, action movie that is great for a rainy or slow movie going day.

Grade: A-