I rather take it like this : last evening, i came back from work, slipped on the pavement and sprained badly one ankle ! In pain to walk and having to rest, i watched this movie as it was the scheduled one … and it was very funny to see for a 1st time, a character having the same health problems than me : here, Michael Douglas is badly bitten by a dog so he limped all the movie ! In addition, he plays a great compassionate, helpful guy who lost his way due to bad habits and get stuck in a dangerous dead end ! And that's probably where i'm actually too. So this was really a great time watching it all the more than the cast is really prestigious : Tobey as the lost student, Katie Holmes as the straight one, Frances as the usual serious and romantic as well wife, and Downey Jr as the usual careless, cool buddy. As the movie happens at winter in Pittsburgh, the locations are beautiful and the story is full of turns, surprises and stress to keep going. However, the movie has a big flaw : the gay context ! Chabon already did a whole movie about this and here to have Downey seducing Tobey is really disappointing and in my opinion totally useless : I'm not homophobic but today cinema plays much too more this card as if being gay or bisexual is a necessary ingredient for whatever the movie is about ! In a way, as a straight guy i feel oppressed the same way i'm with the need for any action movie to solve problems with a gun and with killing the bad guys ! I don't like this message so that's why i give « 4 » and not « 7 » !

Professor Grady Tripp's life is an utter mess: his wife has left him, his lover (who also happens to be the chancellor of the university he works at) is pregnant, his editor is visiting him to verify whether his new novel is complete, he must deal with his two most brilliant students: Hannah Green, who has a huge crush on him and James Leer, a rather somber guy with a great talent for writing. Add to the mix a dead dog, a priceless jacket, a stolen car and a nasty case of writer's block and the result is a recipe for disaster.The above mentioned plot is perfect for a delirious comedy of errors, but director Curtis Hanson and screenwriter Steve Kloves take Michael Chabon's renowned book Wonder Boys and they achieve an elegant, witty and exhilarating portrait of a man whose life demands to get fixed before things get worse. This made with an admirable balance between comedy and drama that few movies can accomplish.Some people may claim this is a movie about mid-life crisis, and in some level it is, but it goes beyond that notion and addresses the search of identity in more than one way. Grady, for instance is looking for himself and tries to find out what went wrong and what's gonna happen next. James Leer, a gifted mind rejected by almost everyone will find in Grady the encouragement he might need to come out of his shell. Or Terry Crabtree, Grady's homosexual editor, who's in urgent need of a literary hit in order to stay relevant and keep his job (and he'll be a key element in James' coming of age). In addition to that search, they have to deal with the pressure of not living up the expectations created around them and see how others enjoy the success that possibly has been waiting for them, but they're unable to attain.Wonder Boys avoids favorably most of clichés seen in movies about writers thanks to Kloves' brilliant approach to Chabon's provocative work, remaining faithful to it, but giving in life on its own way. And Hanson's expert hand makes the movie flow with great pace and timing. But it's safe to say Hanson's best quality (as seen in his previous movie L.A. Confidential) is to push the right buttons with his actors. In this case we have people like Katie Holmes, Frances McDormand and Robert Downey delivering superb work, Tobey Maguire who captures James' vulnerability and sadness in a very unique way. And Michael Douglas in a career-best performance as Grady (superior to his Oscar-winning work in Wall Street and close to his Emmy- winning one in Behind the Candelabra). Is hard to imagine someone else playing a very conflicted and distressed man with such sense of humanity and plenty of irony and humor.One thing must be clear: Wonder Boys is a comedy, but not in the traditional sense of the word: it's a sophisticated and smart piece about what we really want and need to do in life and how to do it before it's too late.

Wonder Boys never disappoints. It's dry humour and bizarre imagination never stops for a second, and we are glued with a grin on our faces. Hardly realistic, the audience can still feel for the characters as their lives spiral into a comic frenzy. Grady and his off-beat world crumbling around him as he searches for happiness; Terry, the flamboyant homosexual who puts on a brave face, believing in others as he searches for a comeback novel (which he will not get from Grady); James, the loner who needs to release the genius within himself. These are the wonder boys. Frances McDormand and Katie Holmes gladly take a back seat in the story as this film refuses to be weighed down by sap.The acting is flawless, with at least two superb supporting roles. Robert Downey jr sparkles in his greatest role since Chaplin, but it is Tobey Maguire who makes us feel he has always been that awkward, deadpan student that is James Leer. For those who have seen Pleasantville and The Cider House Rules will recognise Maguire for the talent he is (it almost makes one feel he sold out when taking the Spider-Man role), and here he has been sadly overlooked for a Best Supporting Actor nomination. Douglas is in fine form as he always is in these strange and demanding roles, the last one being Falling Down. He can play a suicidal maniac and a stoned teacher and both roles will seem tailor made. The direction is impeccable as Hanson allows the characters to shine and the story flow, and it is almost unbelievable that this man directed the gritty, deadly serious L.A. Confidential. He packs Kloves screenplay with comic beauty and I sincerely hope he continues to direct these understated movies.

Alternating between an oddball comedy, a surreal thriller and a meditation on the nature of writing, Wonder Boys is an original and thought-provoking film that doesn't quite reach its goal. It's unclassifiable and virtually indescribable, yet all the stylistic tools it uses seem to come directly from any one of the genres it's comprised of; it doesn't do enough to create its own unique style, and therefore fails to focus and become a unique non-genre piece. In other words, it feels too often like a mainstream Hollywood affair, when it's anything but.Wonder Boys is adapted from a very early work by Michael Chabon, to my taste one of the finest American novelists of the last twenty years, and his lack of experience is felt in the script as it is in the novel. It's filled with lots of great ideas, but it lacks in that ever-important focus - and so remains unsatisfying. It's an interesting movie that's worth checking out, especially for those interested in writing and authors, but it's not likely to become an all-time favorite.