Barney's Version

Barney's Version
"Take a ride through the life and memories of Barney Panofsky, a hard-drinking, cigar-smoking, foulmouthed 65-year old hockey fanatic and television producer, as he reflects on his life's successes and (numerous) gaffes and failures as the final chapters of his own existence come sharply into focus."

4.5 Stars

As the film opens, you may find yourself wondering if you have accidentally stumbled in an infomercial about DI-UH-BEET-US because, whether they meant to or not, the make up artists were able to age the initial antagonist Mark Addy into a spitting image of Wilford Brimley.  Now, if you don't understand that reference, don't worry because it wasn't that funny and, I have to admit, a little obscure.

But moving on, let's talk about the movie.  First and foremost it's important that you take the title of  "Barney's Version" into consideration when it comes to interpreting the accuracy of the events of the film.  Barney (played brilliantly in this case by Paul Giamatti) is an unreliable narrator who, although he never actually does a voice over, is giving the audience his recollection and the correlating interpretation of his life.  This intriguing framing device might be most evident in the scene where we see Barney fall in love with his eventual 3rd wife while at the wedding reception to his 2nd wife.  On the surface, it appears as though Barney falls in love with Miriam based on 3 simple criteria - 1) Her looks.  2)  Her appreciation a good Monte Cristo cigar.  3) Her thoughtfulness to update Barney on the final score of a Stanley Cup match he was missing due to the wedding.  Now, this may come off as relatively shallow and almost flippant when you consider the fact that a newly married man is pursuing another woman at his own wedding reception.  But, the romantic in me likes to believe that Barney is experiencing the extremely rare (if even possible at all) Love at First Sight.

Miriam, the object of Barney's affection is played by a surprisingly powerful Rosamund Pike.  I mean, let's be honest, Paul Giamatti can't seem to walk more than 10 feet without tripping over an Academy Award nomination these days.  But Rosamund Pike almost gave me the feeling that she was the critically acclaimed actor instead of the relatively green performer that she actually is.  And that's a conclusion I cam to in spite of the fact that I wasn't necessarily as infatuated with her as Barney was at their initial meeting.  But, even though it took me a little longer, by the end of the movie I was head over heels for her.

There are a lot of other impressive performances in the film too, like that of Rachelle LeFevre and Scott Speedman, but the one I feel I must point out as being superior to all the rest is Dustin Hoffman's.  He plays the boisterous, sometimes border-line inappropriate role of Barney's father Izzy to damn near perfection.  Izzy is a retired New York beat cop who spent 30 years patrolling the "mean streets" and persisted in the face very thinly veiled anti-semitism by administering his own (slightly law-bending) form of justice.  In spite of a hard life, he comes of as a wise, jovial man with no regrets and one I could probably listen to for hours over a glass of good bourbon.

Now, the film does come off as a little left-of-center, but I don't mean that in any sort of negative way.  Nor do I mean that as a code word to imply that this is a weird, artsy movie that only a certain niche of movie-goers are going to appreciated.  But rather, I guess what I mean is that there does not seem to be one particular, all-encompassing theme or direction for the film.  It does jump around quite a bit through various time lines, but the action is never difficult to follow, in fact it's quite the contrary.  This is a direct result of the excellent make up done to the aging characters.  Make up so good, in fact, that it was nominated for an Academy Award.

But, at its very core, I feel like this film is just a portrayal of the common experience we all share of being human and trying to find our own bliss.  Inherently, the mere fact that we are human means that we all have the imperfections and insecurities that have to come along with it, and Barney is no exception.  He is just a decent guy trying to do the best that he can, and this is his story.