A successful news anchor (Hana Yuka Sano) must come to terms with the fragility of societal standards when her world is upended by her sudden emergence of a Japanese accent.
Do you remember when Jim Carrey’s ‘Carl’ resigned himself to saying yes to everything and everyone in “Yes Man”? Or how about the body and life switching in “Freaky Friday”? Well then you’re pretty much prepared for the slapstick pseudo-fantastical comedy that is “Ashley Jones is Perfectly Normal” starring Hana Yuka Sano.
WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD
The concept is a familiar one: protagonist out of place tries to reconnect with what is familiar, but after a lengthy battle with adventure they realize that their new status quo is better. A classic out of the bottle story. The struggle our hero finds herself in comes in the form of a rare condition aptly called “foreign accent syndrome”. Ashley has lived the last six years of her life under the pretense that life is more enjoyable when everything is normal. Larry, her partner played by Chris Yeschenko, and Ashley participate in the same weekly dinner, nightly routines, and mundane work schedule to ensure that their life remains “normal”. This lifestyle is suddenly upended when Ashley wakes up with a Japanese accent, an affliction that would prove all too detrimental in the coming weeks.
Knowing that her boss at the tv station, her friends, and most importantly Larry, will never look at her the same if they were to hear her new voice, Ashley tries in vain to keep this secret for as long as she can. Unfortunately when they all find out, her worst fears become reality as she loses everything she once held dear. It is precisely when she is left with no options that her boss at the tv station, Bruce, gives her one last chance: find the 500,000 year old woman and get an interview. Yes, you read that correctly. Earlier in the film we are introduced to Evie, a rock collecting free spirit who claims to be 500,000 years old. Now, Bruce wants an interview from her and informs Ashley this may be only chance at a return to normalcy.
It is around this point that the film begins to lose me a bit. There is a certain tool that is repeated throughout the film that completely butchered the pace due to its overuse. Several times throughout the movie there are ‘fake-outs’ where we as the audience see something happen on screen, and then are abruptly jerked back into ‘reality’ when Ashley is awoken from a daydream or something similar. This being a problem is no more clear than when the narrator all but assures us that Ashley would never get her voice back and that her attempts at returning to normal would all be in vain and that her story was all but over. But just kidding because we have another half-hour of Ashley trying to return her life to normal. A redundant quest down a familiar path leading to our expected ending.
All of that isn’t to say the movie isn’t without its fun. Larry as the bland, strict routine follower was as entertaining as he was ‘normal’. His inability to understand Ashley’s accent as he was leaving their house forever was one of the comedic highlights of the film. That alongside Ashley’s seemingly infinite bows session with the Japanese couple at the party. The movie is elevated by the electric performance of its entire supporting cast from Evie to Bruce to the recurring Waiter.
Ashley Jones is Perfectly Normal is a movie about accepting what makes you different and what others may see as flaws, and flourishing despite all of the obstacles that may arise because of those differences. The tasteful race humor and moments of elegant writing (such as Evie’s speech to Ashley about being yourself) bring a relatability desperately needed for a film such as this to work. Despite stumbling through pacing and formatting at some points, Ashley Jones is Perfectly Normal manages to craft an enjoyable family experience that both entertains and presents an important theme.
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