I should have stopped when my collecting became a collection. Like so many kids, I collected baseball cards. I liked getting full sets; there was a sense of completion. I liked the cards themselves more than any sense of what they might be worth. Around junior high, however, my friends who collected put values on their collections. At that point, I had an actual collection, something to be evaluated with dollar signs. Baseball card collecting became a competitive game rather than a hobby. And this was exacerbated one-hundred fold by adult collectors and, the “A” word: authentication. Authentication meant you possessed art. Art isn’t a hobby; not for a teen, at least. Authentication was a necessary step in the world of card collecting, but it ruined it forever for me. I didn’t want to own art; I just wanted to get the full set.
Today’s film Can You Ever Forgive Me? is all about the authentication of art, as it deals with celebrity correspondence forger Lee Israel (Melissa McCarthy). This role is a near-perfect fit for the oft bombastic, cantankerous, and self-aware McCarthy as the Israel described is one who seems to have had introversion thrust upon her. It’s hard to tell where the reality portion of this biopic begins and ends as, by all accounts, non-fiction biographer Israel herself was quite the loner –no family, no friends – and well on her way to being a crazy cat lady.
Unsuccessful at winning the world over to the delights of Fanny Brice, Lee begins the film by being fired from her copy editor job (for a display so belligerent you wish the very sour Ms. Israel could at least take some enjoyment from it), and finds herself reluctantly at her agent’s Christmas party where she loads up on food and drink, mocks Tom Clancy, steals toilet paper, and nabs an expensive coat on the way out. It isn’t until the toilet paper thieving that we really get an idea of how destitute Lee is. She also lives like an absolute slob, which probably would be the case even if she did have money. Her bedtime pillow is speckled with flies that have died of old age. That’s nasty.
Penniless, Lee parts with a personal letter from Katharine Hepburn to buy just enough alcohol to drown her sorrows. Shortly thereafter, she discovers a letter written by Fanny Brice hidden in a library book. Now, I didn’t really think this was possible, but apparently in most every library, there is a secret cache of library books available only to professional researchers like Lee Israel. Hence, the odds that Lee Israel would be among the first to discover this particular letter while researching Fanny Brice is actually quite good. She pockets the letter and tries to sell it to the same shop owner who bought her Hepburn. The owner gives her fair value, but points out the content in the missive is bland; a better written letter would fetch a higher price.
“Then he got an idea! An awful idea! THE GRINCH GOT A WONDERFUL AWFUL IDEA”
You can see where this is going, right? Lee Israel is a writer. A penniless writer. A penniless writer who is extremely good at research. A penniless writer who is extremely good at 
research and specializes in celebrity biographies. And right at that moment, a con artist (Richard E. Grant) comes into her life at this time. The movie finds these events coincidental. I say the movie needed to do its research a little better.
For light criminal behavior stemming from desperation, this film is a little tough to watch. Lee Israel comes off as hostile and abrasive at all times, making our potential sympathy wane considerably. The film challenges you to keep a scoresheet: on the sympathy side you have poor, talented, lonely, private while on the other side of the ledger is SHE’S A BIG JERK. I’m torn. This is a great role for McCarthy whose characters so often come across as disagreeable until some scripted contrivance. On the other hand, she plays it so well, it’s tough to muster any kind of positive feeling. She is breaking the law, and she is breaking it in a way in which potentially sympathetic people get hurt. The desire to see Lee Israel find human connection would be so much easier if her alter ego were the sociopath, not her every day persona. I applaud the portrayal, but I wanted a little more from this film.
Sit back, relax, stop your growling
Got a deal that will have all your blokes jowling
For you alone, I don’t kid
All I want’s twenty quid
For this review was written by Rowling
Rated R, 106 Minutes
Director: Marielle Heller
Writer: Nicole Holofcener, Jeff Whitty
Genre: Forging a life
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Lee Israel readers
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Lee Israel victims
