Rating:
by Derek Smith 11/20/05

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In a time when a film as cloying and psychologically elementary as Garden State is taken for the calling sign of a generation, Andrew Bujalski's humble, compassionate and complex vision of youth comes along to call bullshit.  Funny Ha Ha takes an emotionally honest and completely earnest approach to filming the everyday interactions between a small group of 20-something's.  The resulting dialogue not only has a natural, improvised feel, but is deeply rooted in the characters inability to articulate their discontent and confusion in the face of the pressure to instantly become "mature adults".  This could easily have veered into the banal, but the delicate, attentive manner that Bujalski focuses on Marnie's attempts to find a place in the world perfectly express her inner turmoil.  

In short, this film is one of the most accurate portrayals of post-collegiate disillusionment, where the pressures of being assured and confident in your life goals often leads to a disconnect with who you actually are.  Marnie is constantly at odds with herself and her environment, struggling to connect with one guy who likes her and another whom she likes, and casually riding the dying waves of her college social scene.  Comparisons to Cassavetes may be a bit premature, but the willingness of Bujalski's lead character to continually put herself into the fire with the small hope of finding something or someone to connect to is reminiscent of the ever-enduring Gena Rowlands in his films.  What seems aimless and mundane is actually an expression of this limbo state that so many young adults find themselves in, neither ready to give themselves up to the corporate world nor entirely sure of what other options exist.  The films deceptively simple approach leads not to personal epiphanies or discoveries, but a constant stream of disappointments and awkward conversations that evokes both the mundanity of life after college and the difficult transition into adulthood.