Despite the often hit or miss development of his acting career, Ben Stiller has often been seen as an exciting director with such hits as "Zoolander," "Tropic Thunder," and "The Cable Guys." His latest effort, "The Secret Life of Mitty" is arguably his most anticipated directorial project as it features an adaptation of the well-known short story by James Thurber.
The original story explored the psyche of Mitty, a common man with delusions of being things that he is not; he imagines himself as a pilot, a killer, and even a surgeon. The only thing that Stiller's film has in common with the original concept is that Mitty is a day dreamer. The darker elements of Thurber's story are glossed over in favor a more comic and crowd-pleasing film.
Stiller's Walter Mitty works in the negative development department at Life magazine. The company has just been taken over and is preparing its final issue. The company has been asked by photographer Sean O'Connell (Sean Penn in a small cameo) to utilize his great photograph for the final issue, but Mitty cannot seem to track it down. Eventually, the dreamer decides to set out in search of O'Connell and retrieve the missing photograph.
The plot also throws in an added premise that seemingly dominates Mitty's fascination: love. The character has fallen for newly hired Cheryl (Kristen Wiig) and imagines himself performing heroic deeds that will eventually land him the girl.
The film's opening act is filled with a sense of mystery as the viewer gets to check out Mitty at his most imaginative. In one scene he imagines himself a Latin mountain climber that takes Cheryl's breath away. A few scenes later, he is battling his nasty new boss (Adam Scott) in an action sequence reminiscent of a number of superhero movies. In another scene he makes a clear reference to Benjamin Button (another famed American short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald).
The execution of the concept of the day dreams is a mixed bag as it showcases Mitty as striving and yearning man. He has a tremendous amount of responsibilities with his mother and daughter (he essentially supports both of them) and he is stuck as a corporate "ghoul." He has no girlfriend and has never traveled anywhere outside of the United States for an extensive period of time. With the exception of one, his day dreams generally keep him within the confines of his current world, but allow him to accomplish superhuman feats. The certainly contrast in mood, but actually feel a bit unimaginative in their constant references to other films and moods. The superhero battle feels like a repetition of the Spiderman-Dr. Octopus sequence in "Spiderman 2" and the Benjamin Button reference goes on a bit long and feels excessive in its attempts at comedy. However, as the story progresses, the day dreams and real life meld and the viewer starts to have a hard time differentiating where reality starts and ends. The everyday life of Mitty becomes almost as wild as his imagination; while the viewer certainly connects the idea, some of the events that Mitty endures in "real life" start to exceed the limits of believability and question the credibility of the world.
Another major issue with the film is the focus. The story starts off with Mitty attempting to "wink" at Cheryl via the eHarmony, setting up the idea that the love interest is Mitty's ultimate goal. As the story develops, the love story takes a back seat to the search for the photograph and never really materializes in a truly emotional way. Cheryl and Mitty converse and he opens up to her from time to time. However, the viewer never gets a true sense of who Cheryl is and why he is obsessed with her. The result is a rather generic turn by the talented Kristen Wiig.
Other major characters also fail to acquire solid development and turn into caricatures. As expected from most Hollywood antagonists, Scott's character is a nasty know-it-all who bullies Mitty throughout the film. Kathryn Hahn and Shirley MacLaine appear as Mitty's mother but are mainly there to serve as plot devices; there are hints that they dominate his life and impede his progress, but the narrative never really develops this dynamic.
The film also seems to come to a stop at the end of the second act when the photograph mission comes to a conclusion, leaving the third act to meander a bit with no real drive. While the premise seems to promise the examination of complex issues, the answers are straightforwardly positive and life-affirming. While most audiences will find this satisfactory, those seeking more intellectual probing into the concepts and ideas (like Stiller did in his satire of the film industry in "Tropic Thunder") will likely find this film to be more one-dimensional.
That does not mean that "Mitty" has no redeeming qualities. In fact, it has a number of aspects that are worth applauding. Stiller is a master of comedy and has more than his share of laugh-out-loud moments. The constant returns of the eHarmony profile manager (played by Patton Oswalt) are well-timed; this could have easily become an irritating nuisance but Stiller and Oswalt's delivery and banter is terrific. The visuals of this film, particularly those exhibited during Mitty's travels, are breathtakingly beautiful in many instances. Sean Penn's appearance is quite memorable as well.
Despite the expectations created by the original source material, Stiller's latest film foregoes the existential examination and opts for being simply a solid piece of daydreaming and escapism. The overall experience is satisfying from an entertainment standpoint; while the viewer is conscious of the film's shortcomings, there is no doubting that Stiller has the ability to generate an emotional response from his audience. The film is sure to be a crowd-pleaser even if it fails to live up to the previous work of its creator.
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