The Giant Mechanical Man

Some people spent their evening watching the Super Bowl. I spent my evening remembering the roots of this blog - wanting to provide commentary on lesser-known or older films, things that don't have commercials running.

I saw the trailer for The Giant Mechanical Man some months ago, on IMDB.com (like you do), and thought it looked different, and full of heart. Written and directed by Lee Kirk, the film stars Kirk's wife, Jenna Fisher (Pam from The Office) and familiar face Chris Messina (Ruby Sparks, Julie and Julia among his credits). It's Kirk's first full-length film, though, and it kinda feels like it: almost, but not quite there yet.

Janice and Tim are two thirty-something strangers in the city, somewhat aimless, lost souls, whose well-meaning friends and family clearly don't understand. Tim gives the film its title, painting himself gray and silver, walking on stilts, and becoming a sidewalk fixture in pantomime. But it's not enough to sustain himself and his relationship, so when his girlfriend leaves, he decides to buckle down and get a job. Janice is forced to move in with her sister Jill (played by Malin Ackerman) when she is fired from the temp agency, but Jill and her husband have their own agenda. Trying to help, they operate under the misguided notion that pushing Janice into a relationship with a self-help guru (a curiously cast Topher Grace) will help Janice find a sense of direction. Tim and Janice cross paths en route to finding what they need when they both land jobs at the Fillmore Zoo.

What the film gets right, what it does best, is to identify what the characters need, and what they find in each other. Instead of wandering the city looking for love, or even divine purpose, it turns out they're looking for is one person: "Just one person to make you feel special, and valid, and like you belong." Jim and Pam get that. I mean, Tim and Janice.

Lee Kirk's done a great job with Tim and Janice; they're solid, genuine people with good hearts, disillusioned with this capitalist, ridiculous world. The problem is with the rest of the script - unless it was a stylistic choice that I dislike - and the complete emptiness of everything that isn't "Tim & Janice." I realize some of the dialogue between Jill, her husband, Doug, and Janice is intentionally vapid, but the sheer transparency of it neared condescension. Surely those characters could be granted some integrity of their own.

It is different, and if you like an indie romance, you might want to stop and have a look at The Giant Mechanical Man.