Dare to Dream

I think we all fantasize about choices not made, lives not lived. We have dreams about what we could do, or should have done, or might have been able to do if other choices had been made earlier. Could we have a different job, but a different person, have a different life? These kinds of fantasies are natural for humans, with our brains always churning away at something, worrying about details and thinking about possibilities. Dreams are part of what makes us human, giving us the aspirations to try something different and better our futures. It’s natural to dream.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, released in 2013 and based on James Thurber 1939 short story of the same name (which also saw another, previous adaptation in 1947) is all about dreams. It focuses on the titular character, Walter Mitty (played in this film by Ben Stiller, who also directed the film), a dreamer who can’t seem to get out of his own head. Just about anything can send him off on another flight of fancy, thinking about how his life could turn into a Hollywood action film at any second. Especially if he sees his dream girl, Kristen Wiig's Cheryl Melhoff.

To be clear, the setup for the film is very silly, but that’s also the big hook of the movie. It takes that idea of, “I wonder what it would be like if I were an action hero?” and blasts it out to an exponential degree. Little moments become big, CGI-filled set pieces, especially in the first half of the film, and it all plays as a parody of the kids of films that Hollywood has become so fond of making. And with Ben Stiller at the helm, a comedian that loves to lampoon expectations as well as Hollywood, naturally the film knows just how to play up its angles to make a funny, weird, bombasting story that still, somehow, has a lot of heart.

Walter Mitty (Stiller) works at Life Magazine as the negative assets manager. He spends his days in a dark room, looking at all the beautiful pictures of exotic places, or people living extraordinary lives, and it leaves him wanting more. A dreamer at heart, Walter has always had his head in the clouds, but as time has gone on this has only gotten worse. Except now his life seeing other places and watching other people have the adventures he always wanted could be coming to an end: Life Magazine is killing it’s printed editions and, with the assistance of a really dickish new “Transition Manager”, Ted Hendricks (Adam Scott), Walter, and many of the people he worked with, could be on the chopping block.

Things come to a head when famed photojournalist Sean O'Connell (Sean Penn) sends in his latest roll of film, which could end up being the last roll of pictures ever for the magazine. In his note he mentions that shot 25 is one of his best, and would make a fitting photo for the final cover of the magazine. Hendricks wants this shot and he demands Walter bring him the photo immediately. The only problem is that there’s no shot 25 on the roll, it’s somehow missing. Walter knows that if he doesn’t get the photo he’ll be in deep trouble, so he does the only thing he can to get it back: he heads off, across the world, to track down O’Connell and get the missing photo. The life of adventure he’s always dreamed of is finally in his hands.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty has an interesting structure that makes sense once you get into the film. The first half clearly establishes the character of Walter, the dreamer always wishing for a life of adventure he can’t have, as well as the stakes he’s working with. He wants to save his job, he wants to do right by Life Magazine, and he really wants to get the girl, Cheryl. He’s had his eye on her for months but never could get up the courage to ask her out. She’s one more missed opportunity, one more adventure he was too scared to take. He needed a way to get shaken out of his rut.

This first half is full of Walter’s stylized fantasies. We get scenes of him throwing himself into a burning building to save a dog, him battling his evil, new boss as they slide across the streets of New York on skis made from asphalt, and scenes of him trying to romance Cheryl, all done in an over-the-top and silly way. It’s fun, and it keeps the early act lively. While one could call all of this padding, it actually helps to sell the idea that Walter is a dreamer stuck in his own head, and you feel for him as his fantasies are all far more interesting than anything going on in his real life.

Once he realizes the photo is missing and he has to go chasing off after it, though, the film changes drastically. Instead of Walter dreaming about far off places and the adventures he could have, he’s actually in those places having many adventures all his own. He heads to Greenland and ends up taking a helicopter to a boat before having to jump off while in midair. O’Connell isn’t there, though, so he next has to venture to Iceland where, after trading for a skateboard, he takes a pretty awesome speedrun down a highway before ending up in an empty city… all before he has to speed away in a car as a volcano erupts behind him. At each turn Walter ends up having the kinds of adventures he always dreamed of, but now for real and not just in his head.

It’s a pretty interesting shift for the film, one that actually punishes the character forward. Now instead of being afraid to venture out of his comfort zone, to put himself out there and try new things that might be dangerous, he’s actually doing real things, heading across the globe just to take care of business for himself. By the time he ventures out to the Afghan Himalayas, and adventure like that doesn’t even seem to phase him. He’s been through a lot and seen so much that hiking his way over a mountain starts to seem like a walk in the park for him. It’s interesting, but also shows real growth for Walter.

Of course, that all comes back in the end for him discovering his true self so that he can try to win Cheryl’s heart. It’s not reductive to say she’s kind of his real goal, the prize at the end of his journey. The film makes her into a fleshed out character, with her own past, wants, needs, and goals, and while the film ends on an up note for the two of them, it doesn’t commit to the kind of sweeping romantic ending that only Hollywood would dream up. Of course it wouldn’t, because Walter has finally escaped those kinds of fantasies and now that he’s living in the real world (and not just in his head) he’s ready to try and be the guy for Cheryl. It’s a good note to end the film on as it truly shows the kind of growth Walter needed to be his best self.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty does a commendable job of playing both in Hollywood fantasy and a more grounded reality. All of this is done under the steady eye of Stiller, who manages to capture both the adventure of fantasy and the beauty of reality in his film. From the CGI-laiden early scenes, the beautifully filmed later adventures, it feels like the film takes along on a sweeping quest for its character. It’s a film that knows exactly what it wants to be and how to get there, providing all the thrills, and heart, that Walter needed in the process. It was a modest success in theaters when it was released back in 2013, but it’s ripe for rediscovery on streaming. Take this as the incentive needed to give the film a try so you can enjoy all the many great moments this film has to offer.