In a World…: best comedy this year so far

Actress Lake Bell wrote/directed/stars in In a World…, the story of an underachieving voice coach who still lives in the house of her dad, the king of movie trailer narration.   She’s disheartened when he kicks her out to make room for his new and very young squeeze, but she lucks into a voiceover gig herself and is “discovered” as the hot new talent.  In fact, she’s up for the most prestigious new payday when she finds out that her dad is not as supportive as one might expect…

Here’s why In a World… is so damn good – Bell has written a very funny comedy about a generational rivalry and woven it together with a Hollywood satire, an insider’s glimpse into the hitherto under-the-radar voiceover industry and a romantic comedy.  The romantic comedy thread, in which our heroine is oblivious to the nice guy who really likes her, is better by itself than most romantic comedies.  But we also get many LOL moments among the self-absorbed and back-stabbing Hollywood set.  Plus there’s a very sweet story of the relationship between the protagonist’s sister and her hubby – that could stand alone and be better than a lot of indies as well..

Bell gets most of the laughs from the foibles of the characters and from really intelligently crafted dialogue.  But she know how to pull off a physical gag, too.  At one point, our heroine wants to be kissed by a handsome Hollywood bigshot, but when it happens, his technique is to put her entire nose into his mouth – and her surprise and discomfort is very funny.

Fortunately, Bell was able to cast Fred Melamed, a distinguished voiceover artist, as the father.  Melamed has been the voice of CBS Sports, the Super Bowl, the Olympics and Mercedes-Benz.  He’s also a brilliantly funny actor.   I called Melamed’s performance as the hilariously pompous and blatantly manipulative Sy Ableman in A Serious Man “the funniest movie character of the decade”.

Bell’s previous roles have been secondary parts that have taken advantage of her unconventionally severe beauty.  You may remember Bell as Alec Baldwin’s new trophy wife in It’s Complicated.  Having written it herself, she finally has a role in which she can show her comic chops.  I turns out that she’s a gifted comic actress, with screwball timing, a rich take and a knack for physical comedy.

The rest of the cast is uniformly good.  I especially enjoyed Rob Corddry (Warm Bodies) as the long suffering husband of the sister.

In a World… is a complete and winning film.  It’s already almost September, and so far, In a World… is the year’s best comedy.