RUNNING WITH SCISSORS

by Kevin Koehler

I've already made my feelings on memoirs known (in short: real writers make stuff up). Certain authors seem to have taken my advice to heart, notably Oprah whipping-boy James Frey; his recovery best-seller A Million Little Pieces, marketed as nonfiction, was actually a million little fabricated and embellished anecdotes. Readers understandably felt betrayed, having invested themselves in a story now stripped of its veneer of truth.

I don't like James Frey. He lied out of egotism and greed; the entire Pieces charade undermined any message of rehabilitation and redemption he may have hoped to impart. None of these things mean he is a bad writer, though - A Million Little Pieces is a terrible book for other reasons.

The Coen Brothers' Fargo begins with a title card: "This is a true story. The events depicted in this film took place in Minnesota in 1987." It's a lie; Fargo is not a true story, at least not in the factual sense. "It aims to be homey and exotic, and pretends to be true" says Ethan Coen. The title card is a stylistic device (as it always is), but it's also an ironic joke. Some people don't get the joke. These are probably the same people who read memoirs.

Running with Scissors, adapted from Augusten Burroughs' acclaimed novel, begins not with a title card but a voice over: Augusten (Joseph Cross) reflects on where the film should start. "I guess it doesn't matter where I begin," he says, "because nobody is going to believe me anyway." Speaking only for myself, he's right. I don't believe him, not necessarily because events in this motion picture did not happen to Mr. Burroughs (though this has been called into question; see below), but because they don't feel like they happened. Certainly not like this.

Augusten has a rather unconventional home life. His father (Alec Baldwin) drinks and doesn't appear to like his family very much. His mother, Deirdre (Annette Bening), is the kind of damaged, feminist housewife who names her son "Augusten." A short aside: the real-life author was born Christopher Robinson and legally changed his name at the age of eighteen. You wouldn't know this by watching the film as this creative reinvention and chosen nom de plume probably says more about Augusten than his mother; such is the manner in which the film picks and choses reality, but I digress. Moving on, Deirdre uses her child as an emotional crutch while dreaming about having her poetry published, anywhere really, but mostly in The New Yorker. She has some liberated ideas about parenting: "Augusten, please don't smoke my cigarettes. You have a pack of your own." Her son doesn't enjoy school so she doesn't make him go.

Enter Dr. Finch (Brian Cox), an eccentric, Yale-educated, and scatologically obsessed psychiatrist. He quickly ingratiates himself into the Burroughs family, first as a surrogate father and then a literal one when Deirdre signs over guardianship of Augusten after separating from her husband. "Dr. Finch is spiritually evolved," she tells her son. "We'll be safe with him." He also lives in a crumbling mansion reminiscent of Grey Gardens, painted pink with a two-year-old Christmas tree in the living room; his own family includes a wife (Jill Clayburgh) who eats kibble, a predatory gay son/mental patient (Joseph Fiennes), and two daughters (Paltrow and Wood) who attack each other with Freudian psychobabble like "you're so oral you'll never get to anal." Touché.

Writer/director Ryan Murphy is best-known for having created the television series Nip/Tuck. Clear to anyone who has seen that show, subtlety is not one of Murphy's chief strengths/interests. Here, he frequently allows his actors to go off the deep end, particularly Bening, who turns in a performance short on humanity and long on the kind of belligerent narcissism that has characterized her recent film appearances. Predictable period dressings and song choices abound; it's life as I Love the 70s episode, which is no life at all. Reminders that These Things Actually Happened become something close to a necessary evil for so little in the picture has the ring of authenticity. The author himself appears in the last frame of the picture beside his on-screen counterpart, a zenith to a Where Are They Now closing montage that's about as genuine as the end of Animal House - it's desperate, really, and no more credible than taping Grant's photo to a five-dollar-bill and calling it a fifty. How does one relate to someone that gives their child to a man who speaks openly about his own feces and masturbation habits (Finch keeps a special room he calls his "Masturbatorium"); what about the boy who stays there with relatively little complaint? It's a story populated by characters not people, all displaying wildly antisocial behaviors for the seeming purpose of giving the teenage Burroughs something to write about when older. It may be factual but it is not Truth.

Interesting footnote: An article in the January 2007 issue of Vanity Fair raises provocative questions regarding the authenticity of Running with Scissors. The Turcotte family (renamed Finch in the book) are suing the author and his publisher for libel and invasion of privacy. The suit states that Burroughs "literally has fabricated events that never happened and manufactured conversations that never occurred." They have already reached a settlement with Sony Pictures for an undisclosed amount.

© Pretentious Musings. This review may not be reprinted, in whole or in part, without the express consent of its author.