Lars (Ryan Gosling) lives in his brother Gus’s garage in bleak Wisconsin. He has no friends, prefers not to be touched, and is at best eccentric, at worst mentally ill. His pregnant sister-in-law Karen (Emily Mortimer) is determined to make him feel included in her and Gus’s life, even if she has to physically tackle him and drag him to the dinner table (which she does). The small community views Lars as well-meaning and lonely rather than antisocial, possibly because he has developed the brilliant trick of accompanying all of his social feints and dodges with a disarming grin. When Lars shows up at Karen and Gus’s door with a life-sized, anatomically correct sex doll he introduces as his girlfriend (an orphaned, wheelchair-bound missionary), they decide it’s time to get him some help. The town doctor/shrink, Dagmar (Patricia Clarkson), diagnoses Lars with a delusion that he’ll outgrow when he no longer has need of it, and recommends his family play along.
I loved this film, which, despite what you might think, is not at all about sexual dysfunction or sexual politics between men and women. Rather, it is about one man’s specific struggle to acclimate himself to human contact. It’s sad in a quiet way, but despite the miserable Wisconsin setting, the dullness of the character’s daily lives, and the darkly comic premise, it’s more a feel-good picture than anything. Watching it, I kept waiting for the offensive joke, or the cynical twist, or even the surely inevitable moment when Something Really Bad happens, but it never came. Rather, the characters go about their business, trying as best they can to be kind to each other despite awkwardness and hurt feelings, and in the end, they all seem likely to prevail. This is not a challenging or brave movie, but it is a hopeful and entertaining one that allows its characters dignity and individuality.
Plus, the entire cast portrays thoroughly likable characters. Kelli Garner is smackably adorable as Margo, a coworker with a hopeless crush on Lars. Garner’s Margo twitches in a perpetual state of breathless anticipation, her rabbity face always at the ready to beam with joy or crumple in devastation at any chance remark. Emily Mortimer manages to radiate an all-encompassing warmth and maternal solicitude as Karen, despite her squeaky voice and reedy frame. And Ryan Gosling plays Lars perfectly, using every gesture to simultaneously telegraph both his wish to be left alone and his fear of giving offense. Yet in situations where Lars feels comfortable, he drops all his affectations like a sheet (or the baby blanket he carries at all times), and startles those around him with his sudden candor.
