A Little White Lie

A Little White Lie

In “A Little White Lie,” a film by writer/director Michael Maren, deceit is the name of the game. It is set in a small part of the literary world that does not exist. This is where an average Joe fools everyone into believing that he is a reclusive author with one hit book to his name. The world knows it as the truth and also thinks it’s a super controversial piece. But conceiving a con for its impostor protagonist isn’t this movie’s biggest lie that would be its messy script and direction, which waste an amusing enough idea and the lackluster performances of A listers who seem to want little more out of their roles than fulfilling contractual obligations.

fronting all this noise is Michael Shannon, one of America’s finest actors whose eyes are as sharp as any blade and whose face has so many angles he can make it look simultaneously threatening and powerful just by turning one cheekbone slightly askew but here, alas, Shannon looks meek and confused as C. R. Shriver, or rather: a Shriver who has nothing whatsoever in common with the famous writer except for their last names; perhaps part of Shannon’s skittishness is intentional (his character being not so much an enigmatic genius from New York City pretending to be another enigmatic genius from New York City.

Who wrote The Goat Time as he gave birth to himself but instead some dude born somewhere else), but mostly it just seems like wasted effort on his part because whenever he speaks softly into thin air while staring off into space through soulless eyes you can practically see him thinking about what went wrong in life that led him here tonight.

and yet still: we follow along when depressed Shriver (who used to write novels until everyone stopped caring) gets invited downstate by Acheron College, some struggling midwestern university’s annual literature festival where they think he’s real; Simone Cleary (Kate Hudson, lightyears away from her “Glass Onion” movie star charisma) is a professor there who also writes books and has always wanted to bring a big name like Shriver onto campus because she believes this might finally make those budget desk bean counters take notice and approve next year’s funding requests for creative writing workshops nobody attends anymore; the drill is familiar fake Shriver tries his best to blend in, gets dragged from one puffed up panel discussion on postmodern semiotics to another stuffy cocktail party where everyone talks about Foucault’s pendulum over warm white wine spritzers while pawing at each others’ leather elbows beneath dim fluorescent lights hung too low over cherrywood bars that still reek of cigarettes even though you’re not supposed to smoke indoors anymore in any public place anywhere but especially not during a pandemic; none of it makes any sense but he dutifully checks off Cleary et al. on his itinerary beside things like “stare blankly” and “listen without hearing” until eventually winding up alongside Delta (Da’Vine Joy Randolph), superfans number two through infinity, nosy journalist (Benjamin King), M. Emmet Walsh as yet another professor, etc., or whatever supposed to be funny hijinks ensue I think. The movie is never funny.

The issue of “A Little White Lie” adapted from Chris Belden’s novel Shriver is among many that the film fails to address: why did Shriver become world-famous on the basis of one book? This question comes up especially during a Q&A with Aja Naomi King’s feminist author Blythe Brown, when someone asks her why she thinks Shriver is sexist for writing a book full of offensive language.

So if his prose hasn’t aged well, why does Acheron invite him? And if The Goat Time is that problematic, why does liberal minded Cleary still think so highly of it? But before we can ask any more questions like these, the movie takes an abrupt turn: Brown disappears and Detective Karpas (Jimmi Simpson) starts investigating Shriver as his prime suspect.

“A Little White Lie” also makes vague gestures toward two things: the pretentiousness of the literary world and creators’ imposter syndrome. Maren seems unsure about what kind of story he wants to tell here; with such thin characters and plot points that feel like caricatures, it’s hard to say whether he’s critiquing or just participating in these familiar tropes. And some of his stylistic choices don’t help matters: the second-most shocking thing about a second Shannon showing up out of nowhere to represent Shriver’s inner voice is how trite this idea feels.

Nor do Alex Wurman’s endlessly searching score (a jazzy beat that neither meshes with nor elevates the film’s tone) and the movie’s overly crisp look, which only serves as a reminder that even an average TV episode manages to feel more cinematic these days. It might have been one thing if at least we could root for Hudson and Shannon’s characters to fall in love but since both actors are giving indifferent performances, no palpable chemistry ever materializes between them.

The story has a double twist up its sleeve, a resolution that features a charming enough Zach Braff in an unforgettable cameo. But it’s also an annoying one: it serves no purpose except to make “A Little White Lie” even less compelling, to tell you a little cold-hard truth.

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