Will Ferrell has made his Truman Show.  For those who don't know what I mean because you haven't seen Jim Carey's 2nd best film of all time — why?  Rent it now, this instant.  Then come back here and we'll continue.

After years of coming up with bizarre situations to catch the audience off-guard and make them fall out of their seats laughing, there comes a point when the limits of talent are being pushed and the territory of repetitiveness expands.

And the Comi-tragedy is the perfect vehicle of choice for a middle-aged comic looking to stay fresh. A tricky genre to master, the payoff is great when done right.  Who better to tug at our hearts than a really nice guy in despair?  He's someone we can relate to, someone who makes us laugh and with whom we've perhaps shared a few embarrassing moments.

Harold Crick is one such man and between Ferrell's acting, the writing of Zach Helm and Marc Forster's directing he has had life breathed into him on the silver screen.  You will laugh, you will cry — it's not a promise, it's a threat.  This movie works hard to earn the chuckles and tears, it deserves them so pony up.  There are none of the cheap tear-jerking moments you may have come to expect from other films, nor is the humor entirely infantile.  It is, in the words of Harold, pretty straightforward.

Dustin Hoffman, as usual, does his job well although beyond that there isn't much to say.  Conversely, both Maggie Gyllenhaal and Emma Thompson give brilliant performances.  Ms. Thompson in particular has really run the gamut through her very diverse roles these past few years and although Harry Potter fans may disagree, the character of Karen Eiffel is a lot more three-dimensional than Rowling's Trelawney and allows Thompson to really show her stuff.

All-in-all, this is the must-see movie of the year.  It's not controversial, it's not the best comedy, the best drama or even the best story.  It's simply the best all-around.  There is something in it for everyone and it is an instant classic.  A far cry from yet-another comedy or action movie, Stranger Than Fiction has earned a place in my DVD collection when it's released because it's the kind of movie you'll want to see again and again.

- one 

Google has done the easily thinkable, the completely imaginable, for an utterly unbelievable price.  $1.6 Billion in Google stock has been transferred to the owners of YouTube in exchange for YouTube stock (which was privately held).  Guess what this means, folks?  The party's over.

Get the firefox extension I linked to a few days back when I wrote about South Park, or another tool like it and download your favorite videos because there is simply no way to reconcile Google's multi-billion dollar bank account with ownership of this copyright lawsuit waiting to happen.  They're going to have to weed through YouTube's entire library and start ripping out videos by the handful.

And to clarify, Google will not do this because they are evil, or have turned into heartless, cruel corporate giant-types.  They have, but that's besides the point (I'm kidding.  I love you Google!  We're still getting together tonight, right?)  No, Google will do it because the mere liability YouTube represents forces their hand.  They stand to lose millions, at the very least, if they stand idley by and wait for the original meaning of "You Got Served" to make itself abundantly apparent.

So browse through like mad and download like crazy because it's all going BYE-BYE!

- one

P.S. - The opinions of the above commentator do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Dark Logistics, other commentators, Google, YouTube, Symantec or John Kerry.  They do not even reflect the opinions of the above commentator.  Piracy of copyrighted material is a serious crime punishable by the RIAA, MPAA, ATF and  Secret Service raiding your house at 4am and waking you up with the stock of an MP5 to your ribs.  So make sure you use anonymous proxies when you download.