Up, up and away with "Danny Deckchair"
Danny Morgan (Rhys Ifans) is a walking contradiction: a man who pours concrete for a living and dreams of weightlessness, of floating away from a life that doesn't suit him anymore. At work, he keeps falling into freshly poured concrete; at home, his girlfriend Trudy (Justine Clarke) lies to avoid going camping with him and has been spotted around town with another man. One day, in the midst of a backyard barbecue, Danny tests out a theory: He inflates balloons with helium and ties them to a deckchair. And, just like that, he's off — soaring through the Sydney skies, on his way to another life.
Still with me? Yes, the Australian comedy "Danny Deckchair," written and directed by Jeff Balsmeyer, is as light as those balloons, and whimsical enough to raise any cynic's eyebrow. It's also, despite some undeniably slow bits, an uncomplicated charmer. Like last month's "Seducing Doctor Lewis," it creates a world you want to be part of, if only for 90 minutes.
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Much of the credit for the film's mood goes to Rhys Ifans, that sleepy-eyed Welsh actor best known for playing Hugh Grant's scuzzball roommate (in tatty gray underpants) in "Notting Hill." His Danny has a childlike sweetness combined with restlessness; early in the movie, we watch him puttering around the house, seeking a project. (Seeing the entrance to the attic crawl space, his eyes light up as he says, "Haven't been up there in a while!") No real reason is given for his balloon experiment, just as there's no reason for him to be in the attic — it's just that the balloons and helium tanks appeared in his path. They're another potentially good idea, from a man who's full of ideas, most of which the petulant Trudy dismisses.
But that balloon-lofted chair turns out to be Danny's yellow brick road — it deposits him in the faraway town of Clarence, in the back yard of Glenda (Miranda Otto), a parking cop with round blue eyes and a decisive manner. A go-with-the-flow kind of guy, Danny soon gets swept up in the life of the town, where people listen to his ideas and think that he matters, and where he sees a new, happier future with Glenda. But this idyll in Oz must come to an end: The media, dazzled by Danny's flight, eventually tracks him down, and he must choose between the old life and the new.
Balsmeyer's screenplay occasionally flattens out (particularly during an inspirational speech delivered, impromptu, by Danny to the town), but just when you're tiring of the movie, he disarms you: Though the ending takes longer than it should, it's followed by an epilogue that's so charming that you float out of the theater on your own helium cloud. And Ifans, usually relegated to supporting roles, steps into the leading-man role with his own brand of lightheaded ease. He's a man doubly in love — with the reluctant but dazzled Glenda and with the romance of beginning again.
Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com