Gervais’ deadpan humor perfect for ‘Ghost Town’
‘Ghost Town’ starring Ricky Gervais, Greg Kinnear and Tea
Leoni
We’ve all known people who are generally unpleasant to be
around. There are the people who are constantly complaining about
everything in their lives. There are those who are self-absorbed
and fail to notice the world around them. There are those who
always look at the glass half empty. And then there are those who
are just plain mean.
Bertram Pincus is a little of all those things, but mostly he is
just plain mean.
Gervais’ deadpan humor perfect for ‘Ghost Town’
‘Ghost Town’ starring Ricky Gervais, Greg Kinnear and Tea Leoni
We’ve all known people who are generally unpleasant to be around. There are the people who are constantly complaining about everything in their lives. There are those who are self-absorbed and fail to notice the world around them. There are those who always look at the glass half empty. And then there are those who are just plain mean.
Bertram Pincus is a little of all those things, but mostly he is just plain mean.
Pincus is the central character in “Ghost Town,” a movie that received a somewhat limited release and is still playing in a few theaters in the area.
Ricky Gervais, the British creator of “The Office” plays Pincus as a bitter dentist who enjoys his career mostly because he can shove cotton into people’s mouths to keep them from talking.
Like Gervais, who has a quiet, dead-pan sense of the humor, much about the movie is understated. There is no loud, obnoxious bodily humor despite a colonoscopy playing a large role in the plot. There is no dramatic, cue-the-music as the main characters fall in love scene in the movie. But there is a quiet humor that makes viewers want to stick with Pincus to the end.
Pincus is the kind of man who will steal someone’s cab without even realizing he’s done it – he just doesn’t look at those around him. And if asked to hold the elevator, he will quickly hit the “close door” button to avoid the small talk. He has been on auto pilot, it seems, for years.
His quiet life is interrupted when he goes in for a colonoscopy and asks for general anesthesia. When he leaves the hospital, he starts seeing people who no one else can see and he assumes he is hallucinating. It turns out that he “died” for seven minutes while on the operating table, and now he can see dead people. And every one of them has a favor to ask of him.
The primary ghost who haunts Bertram is Frank Herlihy, a wealthy man who died when he was hit by a bus. Herlihy may be charming in all the ways Bertram is not, but he certainly isn’t any nicer. On the day he died, he was trying to set up a love nest for his girlfriend on the side without his wife finding out about it.
Frank believes he is still hanging around on Earth because he is supposed to keep his widow Gwen (Tea Leoni) from marrying a lawyer. He promises to keep all the other ghosts at bay if Bertram will help him break up Gwen’s engagement to a human-rights lawyer.
Bertram has seen Gwen a million times since the two live in the same apartment building in Manhattan, but he has never really looked at her until Frank makes him slow down and take a break. Bertram’s years of isolating himself from people make it difficult for him to interact with Gwen at first, especially since she remembers him as the jerk who stole her cab. But the awkward way in which he fumbles over his words is true to life for most of us who get a little flustered when talking to the object of our affection for the first time.
As Bertram spends more and more time with Gwen at Frank’s insistence, he starts to open about himself and for once in his life, to listen to what someone else has to say.
The point of the movie is cliche, as Bertram discovers that being a jerk isn’t serving his best interest or anyone else’s. But there are definitely enough laugh-out-loud moments to make the movie worth a viewing. Look for Aasif Mandvi, of “The Daily Show,” as a dentist who shares Pincus’ office. Dr. Prashar is the one who finally helps Bertram see the light.
