Even director Michael Winterbottom has admitted that Laurence Sterne's well-known 18th-century novel, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, is unfilmable. Supposedly the story of a son born to upper-class parents in 18th-century Britain, Sterne keeps deviating from the newborn's life to ramble on about British society. However, Winterbottom succeeds by making a postmodern film within a film, a la Truffaut's Day for Night, by focusing on the making of a screen adaptation of Tristram Shandy, along with eye-opening goings-on behind the scenes.
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In both Tristram's era and well as the contemporary retelling of his story, events do not proceed smoothly. Early on, the film mainly dwells on Tristram's birth. Both the local midwife and a country doctor, who comes across as a quack, vie to delivery the baby. However, Tristram's story actually takes a back seat to the complicated moviemaking process. We get caught up in whether the movie will ever be finished, as well as the juicy interactions between the cast and crew off screen.
There are on-set glitches, such as not having enough funds to make a battle scene look real, which yield laughable daily rushes. Egos flare, as in an ongoing dispute between the two male leads as to which of them has the bigger role, and who gets to flirt on screen with Gillian Armstrong (playing herself as a last-minute hire). There's an emphasis on Steve Coogan, playing himself as well as Tristram and Tristram's father, as a Lothario. His girlfriend and their baby come on location for a visit, yet at the same time, Steve flirts with the production assistant. In addition, he must submit to an interview with an unctuous reporter to prevent a story about a recent one-night stand from coming to light.
The review of this Movie prepared by Elana Starr
