Lars and the Real Girl

When I heard the premise of this movie, I was very reluctant to see it. The last thing I need in my head is a bunch of visuals and Hollywood-psychobabble granting viability to the latest fetish to spring from the salacious and creative retailers of the internet. Who wants to see (or admits to wanting to see) a movie about a man’s attachment to an inflatable sex doll? Why did this movie see the light of day? And why is my wife suggesting we watch it? The reason is because I am going to tell you that this movie is actually deeply human and beautiful.

I know. I had to be persuaded too. I had to get in the mood for something on the level of Idiocracy. I thought this movie would either float along on a stream of predictable naughty school-boyish sex jokes or else would be a deflating lesson in tolerance, a battalion of sociologists to lecture us about accepting those who have chosen a different blah, blah, blah. Boy was I wrong.

Lars and the Real Girl is a film about community, the power of love and sacrifice on the part of many to help one man in need. We learn early on that Lars is a victim of mental illness and his defense mechanism takes the form of an inflatable doll that he orders from the internet. He is painfully shy, living with his brother and sister in law, in a separate garage apartment. When his new girlfriend Bianca arrives in the mail, he is suddenly able to function socially. But to the horror of his brother Gus, Lars treats the doll like a real girl and expects others to do the same.

Filmed in Ontario, Lars and the Real Girl was nominated for many awards, including a Academy for Best Original Screenplay. One of the pleasant surprises of this film is the fact that the producer (Nancy Oliver) and director (Craig Gillespie) are newcomers to major film.