AMERICAN SPLENDOR (2003)

A Film Review
Copyright Dragan Antulov 2005

Thanks to Hollywood, when people today hear of comic books they imagine
larger-than-life superheroes whose spectacular adventures can't be
adequately reconstructed on screen without hundreds of millions of
dollars spent on CGI effects. AMERICAN SPLENDOR, 2003 biographic drama
directed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini, represents
antithesis of that vision.

The protagonist of this film is Harvey Pekar (played by Paul Giamatti),
chronically depressed hospital file clerk from Cleveland who spent much
of his life reading comic books. Along the way he befriended Robert
Crumb (played by Robert Wosniak), cult author of underground comics and
that served him as an inspiration to start his "American Splendor" -
series of autobiographic comic book chronicling his own mundane and
depressing existence. The series is great success which will bring him
fame, guest appearances on David Letterman Show and marriage to Joyce
Brabner (played by Hope Davis), great fan and inspiration for his future
work. But this doesn't bring him happiness and the life has a nasty
surprise for him in the form of cancer.

Authors of AMERICAN SPLENDOR try very hard to make the film look as
unconventional as the life and character they portray. This is seen in
the decision to employ three different ways to reconstruct Harvey
Pekar's life – one is conventional film storytelling with actors;
another is use of animated clips and images inspired by Pekar's comic
books; the third is use of real-life Harvey Pekar who not only narrates
his life but also uses opportunity to comment on actors portraying him
and his friends. This combination of techniques not only manages to
attract audiences' attention but also provides a lot of humour in
otherwise very depressive film.

However, that very technique is also the film's main flaw. Paul Giamatti
is great actor and Hope Davis, when put in the same shot with real
Joyce, can put Charlize Theron and her MONSTER transformation to shame.
However, despite their efforts they simply can't hold the candle to real
characters and suspension of disbelief, necessary for audience to truly
enjoy film, is nowhere to be seen. This doesn't mean that watching
AMERICAN SPLENDOR represents waste of time. Good acting and confident
direction are accompanied with likeable jazz music score that
contributes a lot to the atmosphere of the film. However, AMERICAN
SPLENDOR, despite being interesting and likeable, is a film that could
be truly enjoyed only by the fans of Harvey Pekar's work.

RATING: 6/10 (++)

Review written on February 17th 2005


Dragan Antulov a.k.a. Drax
http://film.purger.com
Film Reviews in Croatian/Filmske recenzije na hrvatskom
http://draxreview.blogspot.com
Draxblog Movie Reviews
http://www.ofcs.org
Online Film Critics Society