INTIMATE JEST
The End of the Tour
Review by Paul Preston
Welcome to the party, Jason Segel.
In the very entertaining “The End of the Tour”, Segel plays one of the most celebrated novelists of the last thirty years, David Foster Wallace, a tortured genius who agrees to a Rolling Stone interview with reporter David Lipsky. The interview lasts five days as Lipsky more-or-less embeds himself in Wallace’s Bloomington, Indiana life and the two men’s relationship vaults from skeptical to friendly to tumultuous.
Wallace, author of the groundbreaking “Infinite Jest”, can best be described as an “odd bird” – reclusive, tentative, sad, not dangerous, although perhaps so to himself, yet always a unique, artistic intellectual. Segel wonderfully embodies Wallace’s lummoxy nature, but never loses sight of his vulnerability (Wallace’s sadness caught up with him when he committed suicide in 2008).
Wallace’s sensitive nature is vividly matched by Lipsky, a fast-talking city writer who becomes so fond of Wallace, he has trouble delivering the questions of a hard-hitting journalist. Equally smart is the casting of Jesse Eisenberg as Lipsky, whose tightly wound features and delivery make for a good contrast.
The two men’s week together could’ve devolved into bromance but instead the film reveals a relationship of the highest design, covering conversation and emotion that you’d give up everything to have regularly. Imagine “My Dinner With Andre” if they got up from the table a lot, or “I Love You, Man”, if….well, in that film, Jason Segel played an eccentric character just because. Because “hey, wouldn’t it be weird if my this character did _______?”. There’s obviously a method to the “madness” here. Don’t let Segel’s presence make you think you’re in for dopey talk about drugs, dicks and pop references. One brief conversation about “Die Hard” reminded me that there had been mostly talk of real substance up to then.
Director James Ponsoldt (“The Spectacular Now”) keeps the story intimate with a lot of close-up and bust-high shots of the characters while writer Donald Margulies really captures a nuanced artist dealing with the fame monster.
It’s quite a performance in a movie that has the same careful feel. Both Segel and the film know they’ve got a delicate subject in Wallace, and both deliver him up for our viewing with the right amount of respect and reality. Wallace never would’ve written anything quite like “The End of the Tour”, but I think he would’ve approved.
Directed by: James Ponsoldt
Release Date: July 31, 2015
Run Time: 106 Minutes
Country: USA
Rated: R
Distributor: A24
