I really wanted to love Fool’s Paradise. Charlie Day is a gem and watching him pay homage such comedy giants as Charlie Chaplin, Harpo Marx, and Peter Sellers in what looked on the surface to be a modern day Hollywood set retelling of Hal Ashby’s Being There is an idea that I really went for. Day is amazing and absolutely lights up the screen every time he’s on it. He’s able to combine the pathos of Chaplin, the zaniness of Harpo Marx, and the naïveté of Sellers’ Chauncey Butler but the film just falls flat in the second half. It also lacks the subtlety of Ashby’s film, choosing instead to bludgeon the audience with a very overly broad satire of Hollywood and celebrity culture, and leaves me longing for the film that could have been.
Fool’s Paradise (2023)
Fool’s Paradise (2023)
Fool’s Paradise (2023)
I really wanted to love Fool’s Paradise. Charlie Day is a gem and watching him pay homage such comedy giants as Charlie Chaplin, Harpo Marx, and Peter Sellers in what looked on the surface to be a modern day Hollywood set retelling of Hal Ashby’s Being There is an idea that I really went for. Day is amazing and absolutely lights up the screen every time he’s on it. He’s able to combine the pathos of Chaplin, the zaniness of Harpo Marx, and the naïveté of Sellers’ Chauncey Butler but the film just falls flat in the second half. It also lacks the subtlety of Ashby’s film, choosing instead to bludgeon the audience with a very overly broad satire of Hollywood and celebrity culture, and leaves me longing for the film that could have been.