THE INVENTION OF LYING (2009)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
Ricky Gervais is Mark Bellison, a screenwriter considered to be a loser by his co-workers and secretary. He has written a script on the Black Death that is considered a downer by his boss (Jeffrey Tambor) and Mark's handsome rival, Brad (Rob Lowe). This can only mean that he will be fired and he won't be able to afford his rent, or please his first date with the woman of his dreams, Anna (Jennifer Garner). All this is not surprising except that Mark lives in a world where everyone tells the truth. There are no lies, no attempts at facetiousness or implication or subtext - everyone tells the naked truth about everything. When Mark meets Jennifer, she tells him that she was masturbating before he came to the door. When they go on a date, she admits that she is not attracted to him and that the evening will not go well (this actually does happen in our world, but never mind that). The waiter is honest about their relationship, and he also hates his job.
The next day, Mark is informed by his landlord that he will be evicted. So what does Mark do? He goes to his bank, and asks to withdraw 800 dollars from his account when he actually has only 300. He lies! And the teller tells him that it is probably a clerical error and gives him the extra money! This makes Mark into the most powerful man in the universe! He can lie to anyone, including his buddies about how he invented the bicycle. They will believe him because nobody lies. He manages to win over Jennifer, which takes time and effort since she doesn't want her kids to look like him. Mark also convinces the world that he knows what happens when people die - they each get the most fabulous mansion in Heaven. This comes down to a moment where Mark writes down the rules about who goes to Heaven or Hell on the back of two pizza boxes!
My most nagging question of what would've been a rewarding "Twilight Zone" episode is how does Mark tap in to the idea of lying when no one else can. Interesting question since he might be termed the smartest person on the planet. The movie assumes everyone is an idiot, except for Mark. How else to explain the crazy scenario he tells his former boss that a coffee-stained script inside a chest emerged from the sea and perched itself on the sand next to him and that it will be the biggest box-office hit of all time! The boss buys it because no one lies, no matter how extreme or unbelievable the fabrication is. Mark is also the only one who tells outrageous stories and masses of people believe every word of it (this may seem prescient since quite a few people believe every word Glenn Beck utters). The words "lie" or "truth" do not exist in this world, but hate and love do seem to coexist. If the movie started to turn on its wheels a little and started to show people picking up on Mark's fabrications and thus learn to lie themselves, it would've made for a unique twist. It doesn't turn out that way.
Co-directed and co-written by Gervais and Matthew Robinson, "The Invention of Lying" has a musical montage sequence that had me squirming and I am not keen on the casting of Jennifer Garner - she was at her best in "13 Going on 30" but, here, she did not convince me she would've grow enamored of Mark. Still, despite not completely exploiting its premise as I had indicated and resorting to rom-com formula (like Gervais's previous "Ghost Town"), the movie is quite moving and spiritual and has a mockingly sentimental ending that ends with the shot of a church and the clouds above, as if we are supposed to buy the religious conceit that Mark himself doesn't believe in. Gervais himself is not a believer of God but I sense that, if he was, he would prefer to lie about it.
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