Not a fan of Will Ferrell as a comedian but agree he did a good job. It suits his personality much better than when he tries to do comedy. There is no such thing as "dark comedy" that is a recent phenomena to excuse offensive entertainment. This should have been labeled drama only. Comedy means it's funny and many so called comedies are not funny unless you like laughing at others pain and misery and I don't. I don't "get" much of what is considered entertainment by the mainstream who just keeps turning out more krap that is beyond believable like a guy would just put up with his wife putting all his stuff out on the lawn like that and the city wouldn't make them clean it up within 24 hours. More depressing than entertaining to me.

After seeing her in the superb 2010 indie Comedy Drama Please Give,I started looking on Netflix UK for more Rebecca Hall titles. Losing track of his projects in the 2010's,I was pleased to find another 2010 Hall indie movie with Will Ferrell,which led to me letting everything else go,for a viewing.The plot:Going off the rails after a big business deal,Nick Halsey meets a girl who goes with him on a night out. Waking up,Halsey is horrified to find that the women has mysteriously disappeared. Unable to remember what he last did with her,Halsey is sacked from his job and dumped by his wife. Returning home,Halsey finds that his wife has changed the locks and left his things on the front lawn. Finding no pals willing to let him stay over, (and new neighbour Samantha looking across the road concerned) Halsey decides to start a new life,via living on the lawn.View on the film:Gingerly going over to see why a neighbour is living on the lawn,Rebecca Hall gives a brilliant performance as Samantha. Being on her own in the house,Hall holds Samantha with a strong independent side which pushes back Halsey's ignorant beliefs. Offering none of the bombast shown in his outrageous comedies, Will Ferrell gives an excellent,broken performance as Halsey. Limiting his comedic side to the odd facial expression, Ferrell takes Halsey down until he hits rock bottom,and the bitter arrogance transforms into rays of optimism as the sun sets.Expanding Raymond Carver's short story Why Don't You Dance?,the screenplay by debuting writer/director Dan Rush displays an extraordinary maturity in getting to the root of Halsey's low pitch. Making sure that everything must go with the usual path of Comedy Drama titles (no love interest!) Rush makes the sometimes abrasive friendship between Halsey and Samantha pinpointing the stage Halsey is at,in looking at his old life,and deciding that everything must go.

The title should also include this movie. It is extremely slow moving, and rather dull.Most of the film takes place in the yard where his wife has kicked Will Ferrell out of the house and placed his belongings in the yard. This is the same day that he has lost his job thanks to falling back to alcohol and a near resulting scandal involving him and a female worker in the office.The young boy who rides his bicycle and ultimately helps in the yard sale says his lines without any form of emotion and he sounds like he is reading them.There could have been a story in itself about the pregnant lady who just moved in across the way and is waiting for her husband to join her.

When people make bleak comedies about alcoholics it tends to be labelled as a tragedy.Everything Must Go starts out with Nick Halsey (Will Ferrell) getting fired in his job as a salesman and then when he gets home he finds his belongings on the lawn, his wife has changed the locks, taken his savings and kicked him out.We find out that Halsey is an alcoholic, has temper issues and decides to live on the lawn with his belongings. His sponsor a police officer has bought him some time so he can have a garage sale. He gets a local black kid to help him out and a newly arrived neighbour (Rebecca Hall) is the only other person who gives him some time. We never do get to see his wife throughout the film.The film is a slow burn as Halsey tries to deal with his situation At first he is angry, frustrated, confused and drunk. We sympathise with his predicament as his wife has left him homeless and penniless.Over time we get to know a little about Halsey and his demons, maybe we can understand the chaotic life he led and the repercussions that caused. Maybe that is the reason why his neighbours could not care less about him.Will Ferrell is restrained as Halsey but maybe too restrained unless when he gets angry because he wants booze. Maybe Rebecca Hall and the kid are symbolisms showing Halsey as a kid or Halsey's wife (as Hall's character is also married to a salesman who is yet to join her.)We know Halsey was once a nice decent guy when he meets up with Laura Dern an high school friend he has not seen for years. Over time he realises he needs to deal with his problems, his alcoholism. He bonds with the kid, he gets rid of all his things in the yard sale and he finds out that he could had got his job back if he had not burst his superior's tyre after he got fired. He even gathers that his sponsor has not been honest with him.As a comedy it does not work, its not funny and too bleak. The title of the movie implies it is making statement of consumerism but it is not even that. Its about a breakdown of one man's life and the few days after in suburban America where the American dreams hit the skids.The film has flaws, no one cares much for him, we are unsure where he goes for his toilet break as he cannot get in the house. I am unclear unless he gets blind drunk how he manages to sleep so well at night. In some ways the film does not go anywhere at all. No optimistic resolutions here it just kinds of peters out. Ferrell is OK, less of his silliness in this but I think he is not stretched as an actor.