It’s poetic to say the least that Aaron Schimberg’s film ‘A Different Man’ was released in the US right around the same time that Todd Phillip’s ‘Joker: Folie à Deux’ was dropped. While the first Joker was about how an ostracized man can take vengeance on the city that spurned him, ‘A Different Man’ has a different take on the case of the outcast. And tells its side of the story with hilarious effectiveness.

Sebastian Stan portrays Edward, a man with neurofibromatosis, a disease that cause often benign tumors to grow randomly around the body. His ailment has manifested in a disfiguring facial condition. Edward often feels like he is in the way, like he is adrift in the world and that he has no real place in it. He hits it off with his neighbor Ingrid, who is an aspiring play write, and the two do seem to form a sort of friendship. Though it never feels like it develops much further.

Edward takes drastic action and has an experimental procedure done that results in his condition being cured. He tells everyone that he is now “Guy” and that Edward tragically killed himself. His life turns around miraculously. He gets a good job as a real estate agent, enjoys casual sex with a coworker, and then runs into Ingrid who of course does not recognize him. She is working on a place about Edward, and of course does not recognize that the man she meets is indeed the very same. Guy/Edward feels like he’s the only one capable of portraying himself and brings a mask of his former self to try to win the role.

Enter Oswald, portrayed by Adam Pearson, an actor that suffers from neurofibromatosis both on screen and in real life. Oswald does not hold the sadness in him that Edward did. He is the most gregarious man anyone has ever met. He wins over Ingrid in a flash, and rightfully claims the part from Guy/Edward while making friends with everyone he comes into contact with. The rage that Edward felt, and now feels again is nowhere to be found in Oswald, who has every right to feel just as bitter and forgotten as Edward did. Oswald rolls through life with ease, ignoring his disfigurement when he can, and enjoying the world at every turn. The charisma in this performance is infectious.

There’s a lot to take away from this film, but the first thing I thought about was how Oswald had so many reasons to feel the rage we hear about from men scorned by society. So much of what the single white male crowd we heard from about the first Joker was in identifying with that isolation. But here we see a character in Oswald who has just as much of a reason (if not more) to have that rage, but embraces the world as it is. He becomes a part of the movie and the people in it so easily, and they (except for the incredibly frustrated Edward) are quick to embrace him back. ‘A Different Man’ also tries to wrestle with how we see the handicapped and disfigured. We can’t just feel sorry for them, or foist victimhood upon them. They have challenges to be sure, but they are capable of deciding for themselves how to advocate for those, and in what ways they choose to.

Adam Pearson has been on a press tour for the film, and he is just as charming and bombastic as his character Oswald. Hearing him speak you’d think he didn’t have a care in the world. But I think they most interesting and inspirational thing he’s side in the press tour for this film is “My disability is the least interesting thing about me. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still pretty goddamn interesting.” That dichotomy, of knowing you have something to be frustrated with, but that it is not your whole identity is the crux of the film, and Pearson and Stan both work double time to send that message home.

4/5