In Lake Bell’s debut comedy, In a World . . . , the writer, director, and star plays a floundering thirty something voiceover actor whose career, personal life, and familial life are all in similar flux. Adding to the anxiety, Bell’s own father, Sam (Fred Melamed), is a legendary voice over player and the inheritor of the famous, deep-throated “In a world. . .” intro that accompanied so many melodramatic trailers in the heyday of action/disaster films. He is also a man in the throes of a midlife crisis that sees him dating someone his daughter’s age. It all sets up a situation in which each aspect of Bell’s messy world – job, love, family – is in direct conflict with each other and her father’s.
Bell’s movie is strongest in its little moments, in the many comedic ideas and situations. She tutors Eva Longoria as a cockney hooker, fumbles through awkward early romance with the dopey Louis (Demtri Martin), and is witness to the crumbling of her sister’s relationship to Moe (Rob Corddry). In many of these subplots, Bell injects her film with novelty and humor, a quirky sensibility that is both real and refreshing. But In a World . . . can’t resist falling prey to comedic conventions which, when looking for a plot structure, send the movie careening towards a heap of clichés. There are award ceremonies and emotional breakdowns, voice acting competitions, and eventually triumph. Each element cleverly adorned by Bell’s comedic asides, but in the end, In A World . . . feels too much like a collection of these ideas, and not really a coherent, or compelling movie.
