Matt Damon and his mustache in 'The Informant.'
Warner Brothers Pictures

Matt Damon's Mustache is one of the stars of Steven Soderbergh's The Informant!.

Dear Matt Damon's Mustache From The Informant!,

I am concerned that you may be feeling neglected. In the run-up to The Informant! (a different movie from The Informant? and The Informant ... and especially The Informant;), there has been a lot of talk about Matt Damon gaining weight in order to play the role of informant! Mark Whitacre, but much less talk about you.

Without you, Whitacre would just be out of shape. With you, he is out of shape and clearly an idiot. Matt Damon plus thirty pounds would just be ... Matt Damon. Matt Damon hitting the craft services table. He's gotten alarmingly skinny before for Courage Under Fire; he still looked like himself. This would not have been different.

It is you, Matt Damon's Mustache, visually transforming Matt Damon into a buffoon. In the trailer, it is you doing the heavy lifting so that his divinely clueless line readings don't simply seem like he's playing it cool, like in Ocean's Eleven. No, with you, we know that he is not someone who should wear a wire, even though he is someone who very badly wants to wear a wire.

I know I should have some defense mechanism against character-building facial hair. I should be able to say, "You must build personalities based on behavior; you cannot cheat!" But you are such an utterly perfect mustache on the face of Matt Damon that my objections collapse.

I think it is your stubbornly unstylish appearance. Not for you the goatee's effort to look cool, nor the mutton chops' calculated irony. Not for you the soul patch's superfluousness or the stubble's implied suggestion that it could win in a fight.

No, you are simply yourself. You are a simple mustache for a simple man. A shade darker, and you would be distracting. A shade lighter, and you would go unnoticed. But you merely pose a question: This guy is going to do something stupid within the next five minutes, right? Even though he is probably a fundamentally nice guy?

My hat is off to you, Matt Damon's Mustache. Surely if they can find ten movies to nominate for Best Picture, they can find a category for you. If I had a write-in ballot, I would write in your name, even though I haven't seen your movie yet. Bravo, sir. (I assume you are a "sir.")

Write back!

Sincerely,
Your Biggest Fan