Who's in It: Molly Shannon, Peter Sarsgaard, Regina King, Laura Dern, John C. Reilly, Josh Pais, Thomas McCarthy
The Basics: Peggy (Shannon) is involved in an all-consuming love affair with her dog — a happy little beagle named Pencil. No, it's not that kind of love affair, but even so, she still doesn't feel the need to date. So when Pencil dies suddenly, her entire life falls apart. Her grieving process involves becoming romantically interested in a celibate, asexual vegan (Sarsgaard) and becoming a radical animal activist. Still, though, that's just plot. It's really about obsession and mania and how even if that mania makes you a pariah you can still be pretty happy. So yeah, it's weird. Go see it!
What's the Deal? What's great about writer/director Mike White is that he doesn't care if you don't like his characters. He'd rather create an interesting person you feel a basic affection for but who makes you uncomfortable and even a little creepy, rather than give you a fake hero to get crushed-out on for 90 minutes. So you still end up rooting for Peggy, even as she spirals into antisocial behavior. You know somehow she's finding her way to her own oddball truth.
Anti-Romantic Lead of the Year: Normally, I don't sit through movies thinking, "Wow, this is great acting!" But Shannon and everyone else in this film nail their characters with such dead-on accuracy, helping to create the movie's "slightly off" tone, that I had to make a mention of it. Sarsgaard, especially, reads like one of those Christian ex-gay guys who just decides to live celibately and shyly for the rest of his life.
But Will My Vegan Friends Like It? I kept asking myself that because I have these good friends who are vegan and animal activists, and on one level, you can read this film as mocking that life path as one that leads to insanity. My vegans, however, have brains and a sense of humor about themselves, so they'll be fine with it. And in the end, it's not even really about that. It's about any radical life shift that redefines a person and makes them voluntarily separate themselves.
See Also: Chuck & Buck, The Good Girl and Babe. The last one isn't from Mike White, but it figures in the story here. You kind of have to love any movie where the heroine takes it on herself to traumatize a five-year-old by having her watch Babe, and then taking her on a field trip to a chicken slaughterhouse.