Everything Must Go gives Will Ferrell another shot at drama and he does a terrific job in film that doesn’t shy away from the bleak reality of alcoholism and what it takes to try to put your life back together.

Nick Halsey (Will Ferrell)  is a great salesman. He’s won awards and put money in his firm’s pocket. Unfortunately, he has also found himself in the cross hairs of a sexual harassment suit following a drunken night at a Colorado retreat. This leads to his being summarily dismissed from his job on the same day that he returns home to find the locks changed on his house and all of his things in the yard. After he discovers his credit line and bank account have been frozen by his soon to be ex-wife, Nick decides that he is just going to stay in his yard with his stuff. A nosy neighbor brings the police to tell him he can’t do that and he has to seek the help of his AA sponsor Frank (Micheal Pena), who happens to be a detective. Frank lets Nick know that if he is doing a yard sale he can have his things out there for three days in effort to buy Nick the time he needs to vacate. Nick begrudgingly enlists the help of local boy Kenny (Christopher Jordan Wallace) to sell his things while finding friendship with a new neighbor, Samantha (Rebecca Hall), who’s just moved across the street. Through the haze of alcohol and regret, Nick has to figure out what to do with himself and get his life back together.

Everything Must Go is a very good film but it is also very emotionally challenging with a main character who is not always very likeable. It takes a frank look at alcoholism without needless pandering or overwrought sentimentality. Nick is a character who has willfully allowed himself to destroy everything he loves and when we join him he is not at all ready to take responsibility for it. Sure, there are some aspects of what happen to him that aren’t terribly fair and make you feel like he is getting a raw deal but in the broad strokes, Nick has done himself no favors.

A lot of films have been made with alcoholic characters and to varying degrees of success. One of the things that separates this film from many others is the fact that it the consequences for his behavior are both harsh and mundane. He doesn’t find himself in some seedy underbelly nor does he do anything particularly horrifying in the name of alcoholism, he just fucks up about everything important to him while realizing that he is just following the same pattern of behavior that he hates his father for. Nick is selfish and delusional in many ways and doesn’t treat people particularly well. For the majority of the film he is not a fun character to be around. What is kind of astonishing about this picture is that, thanks in no small part to Will Ferrell’s performance, Nick is still likeable enough to care about.

Nick’s relationship with Kenny grounds the movie in a lot of ways and while it isn’t what ultimately saves Nick, it helps humanize him in such a way that he is worth caring about. In a lot of films with this sort of relationship you see the main character grow and change based on it but that isn’t really how this goes so much. In this case, Nick puts Kenny on a path that helps him and serves to remind Nick about some important things in life. Still, it isn’t enough to pull him out of his funk.

Nick’s relationship with Samantha likewise doesn’t follow traditional patterns of salvation and attraction. There is really no sexual chemistry here, no hints that Nick is interested in her romantically at all. It is in this relationship, however, that Nick reveals the most about himself both by way of backstory and in terms of how unhinged his drinking problem is making him. Again, this relationship doesn’t fix him but as the film goes the destruction of it serves as a bit of a catalyst for change. That and running out of beer money.

There is some humor in Everything Must Go but it is not a comedy by any stretch of the imagination. Anyone going into this expecting typical Will Ferrell hijinks is going to be disappointed. What you get instead is a soulful and moving picture filled with great performances and poignant storytelling.

Unfortunately the pacing suffers a bit and the movie has moments where it drags. Some of these moments were meant to show drudgery or sorrow but they slow the picture down and give it artificial length. This is not a really huge problem but some better editing could have really cleared things up.

Conclusion [8.5 out of 10]

Everything Must Go is a challenging movie but it is a worthwhile one. Will Ferrell does a great job with a difficult role and the story manages to deliver well worn material without it feeling old and stale. The film is not chock full of cliches or preachy platitudes but rather finds its foundation in the real and ordinary. Everything Must Go is definitely worth watching.