Boxer Brief Interviews with Hideous Mentions

A lesson on how to add credibility to your romantic sitcom demeanor

Movies based on books is a great idea. However, the idea totally outweighs the execution. Usually, the movie ends up being a validating point to a book's longevity. "Well, they made a movie out of it, so it must be good, right?" I can't answer that for you. Now I was fortunate (aka cool and hip) to read this book before the project went underway (not that cool- this is a very popular book, and deservedly so, deservedly so to his death), so I enter the viewing of this movie with nothing but trepidation in my heart. Why? Because the book is off the bonkers in structure and is mainly long section after section of story. And it has what Michael Scott called Big Bird directing. Thats not fair to John Krasinski, sorry. Johnny Krass (what he'll be called from now until it gets old) decided to attach director to his name and craft a seemingly impossible movie out of a book of interviews. So the money question--- was it worth it? I got to say- not bad, Johnny Krass, not bad. JK gets it across fairly quickly that this isn't the book at all, but more a homage to the book, as you can tell he really dug his source material. How can you tell? Well, one he made a movie about it (but that telling was based on relief of the hope he dug his source material) and more importantly, the actors and their detail and pathos they show with each interview. Great casting choices, and great directing. I don't know how much Johnny Krass got into each actor, but fuck if I care because there was some sheer hilarity and moments of honesty that made me wish that JK didn't even have to connect the story and rather just do a shoddy job jumping from interview to interview. No, but he tried. It works though. Julianne Nicholson comes off as, I wanna say, teasing... but that works out in the end. I should say some of the better acting in the movie, but there really was a lot so I'll let my bias show here: Will Forte can just show up and its magic, Bobby Cannavale has never disappointed me, Chris Meloni probably hurt somebody he was so on his game, Josh Charles got his chameleon on, and round of applause for Joey Slotnick and Dominic Cooper. But Johnny Krass saves himself for last, and really can't shake the stigma of Halpert. Even saying the word rape and bitch just felt... boogaloo. Also Ben Gibbard is in the movie because it seemed cool I guess. 'Brief Interviews..' is a challenging movie at points, what with time lapse techniques these days, but when I got lost at least I had 2 threads to go off on: my own experiences of degradation, and a source material that clearly is the star of this movie.