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Monday, August 31, 2009

Film This Week in Film: The Answer Man

Posted by Lindy West on Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 11:22 AM

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Arlen Faber (Jeff Daniels) wrote a spiritual book a long time ago called Me and God. The book changed many lives, because people, apparently, have a lot of questions for God, and Arlen, apparently, answered them. And because, apparently, everyone in America is a complete fucking moron, they believed that he answered them by actually asking God to God's great big face. (Seriously, this is the conflict at the climax of this movie—he has to confess to disappointed fans that he and God are not tight bros.) Now Arlen is haunted by his early success, and becomes a half-hearted recluse (he still totally goes out and does stuff, he's just mildly irritated about it), and can't write anymore, and develops many insincere quirks involving action figures and not touching his dead dad's piano. But when he meets a wacky chiropractor (she eats soy bacon and egg whites!) and a greasy young recovering alcoholic (Step Four: Wash Your Hair, Man), Arlen is forced to loosen up, learn from the wisdom of children, make out with Lauren Graham, and be a human again. STOP ME IF YOU'VE HEARD THIS ONE BEFORE.

Read the whole thing HERE.