Writer / director Sophie Barthes manages to make a Charlie Kaufman film without Charlie Kaufman involved at all. When a friend points Paul Giamatti (who plays himself in this movie) to an article in The New Yorker about a technology that lets you have your soul removed and put into storage, he decides to try it out because he's been angsty and burdened by the role he's playing in a stage production of Chekhov's Uncle Vanya. Of course, once he has his soul taken out, things go about as badly as you'd imagine. I could literally watch Giamatti in anything, and he doesn't disappoint here. Emily Watson is terrific and understated as Giamatti's wife, and Russian actress Dina Korzun is perfectly empathic as a mule who ferries souls over from St. Peterburg. Highly recommended.
January 28, 2009
Yes im the same, Giamatti always delivers - even though Kaufman isnt involved here - it has his rather bizarre fingerprints all over it! - looking forward to it hitting Europe!
Posted by: ferries | April 20, 2009 at 01:35 AM