Advertisement

Movies & TV Movies & TV Reviews

>>> The End Of The Tour

THE END OF THE TOUR (James Ponsoldt). 106 minutes. Opens Friday (August 28). Rating: NNNNWin a Blu-ray copy of THE END OF THE TOUR here!

Watch online: iTunes


I can’t really say how effectively Jason Segel captures David Foster Wallace in The End Of The Tour, which is a matter of some importance to the late author’s more fervent fans. 

But I will say that Segel’s essential sweetness nicely serves the role of a guarded man who makes an unexpected new friend and maybe reveals more of himself than he intends. 

The End Of The Tour isn’t a documentary about Wallace, but a fictional interpretation of five days in 1996 when writer David Lipsky accompanied him on the last leg of a tour promoting his novel Infinite Jest.

Five days is a tiny sliver of time, but it’s long enough for two people with similar interests to get to know each other and flirt with the idea of becoming friends. And that’s what James Ponsoldt wants to convey in his engaging, low-stakes picture: the crackle of energy between two peo-ple discovering they get along.

Jesse Eisenberg tones down his idiosyncratic twitchiness as the watchful Lipsky, who’s writing a profile of Wallace for Rolling Stone. He’s supposed to be an observer, waiting for his careful subject to hint that he’s willing to talk about the trickier sides of himself – his past substance abuse, his depression, his status as a literary gen-ius. Instead, he finds himself drawn into one long conversation about everything and nothing, and having a great time.

There are little flashes of conflict here and there, but The End Of The Tour isn’t a movie with high tensions. It’s very much of a piece with Ponsoldt’s previous Smashed and The Spectacular Now, character studies about people slowly figuring out who they want to be. And like both of those films, it feels emotionally authentic in every moment, with none of the mawkish portent or self-importance a more calculating filmmaker might have imposed.

This isn’t a movie about how David Foster Wallace, Author Of His Generation And Doomed Legend, shared his Pop-Tart with the house guest who would become his acolyte. It’s a movie about two guys hanging out and having breakfast together. That’s why it feels so human. 

normw@nowtoronto.com | @normwilner

Advertisement

Exclusive content and events straight to your inbox

Subscribe to our Newsletter

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

By signing up, I agree to receive emails from Now Toronto and to the Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions.

Recently Posted