THE DOUBLE
***
Director: Richard Ayoade
Screenwriters: Richard Ayoade and Avi Korine - adapted from Fydor Dostoevsky’s eponymous novel
Principal cast:
Jesse Eisenberg
Mia Wasikowska
Noah Taylor
Sally Hawkins
Paddy Considine
Chris O’Dowd
Country: UK
Classification: M
Runtime: 93 mins.
Australian release date: 8 May 2014
Even the press material supplied with Richard Ayoade’s second feature, The Double, describes it as, “a film that resists obvious commercialism, and genre categorisation.” You gotta hand it to the producers for honesty, that’s like admitting that it’s a hard sell and they’re right, which is not to say it’s not without its rewards. For starters, it’s a striking looking film, set in some kinda futuristic yet kinda retro, Kafkaesque nether world. The palette of colours chosen by the design team could best be described as ‘institutional,’ and the lighting and cinematography as ‘dank,’ but this all serves the story well. And what an odd little story it is.
Simon James (Jesse Eisenberg) lives alone in a run-down bedsit in an anonymous city. He’s so timid and repressed that he’s virtually invisible to the people around him; even his mother has trouble remembering him! He’s in love with a co-worker, Hannah (Mia Wasikowska), who lives across the way from him, but who also barely acknowledges that he exists. Acutely aware of his problem, Simon observes, “I’m permanently outside myself. You could put your hand straight through me.” Things look up for him though, when a new colleague James Simon (also played by Eisenberg), comes to work at the same drab company that employs Simon. James is everything that Simon is not, popular, amusing, attractive to women and a bon vivant, and he offers to help the hapless Simon overcome his identity problem in exchange for Simon’s assistance at work. There’s only one small hitch - James is Simon’s doppelgänger. Initially, their arrangement seems to be working well until, little by little, James begins to take over Simon’s life.
As is to be expected from a cast of this calibre, the performances on display are uniformly excellent: Eisenberg copes with the difficult task of playing dual roles exceptionally well; Mia Wasikowska is as nuanced as ever; the supporting cast of Ayoade favourites Noah Taylor, Sally Hawkins, Paddy Considine and Chris O’Dowd are all terrific in relatively minor parts; and veteran actors Wallace Shawn and James Fox, effortlessly bring their amusing characters to life.
Writer/ director Ayoade is probably best known as Maurice Moss, the awkward computer nerd in TV’s The IT Crowd and this script could have been written by that character. If Maurice was the poster boy for people who feel uncomfortable in their own skin, then Simon James is his alter ego. As it is, though, Ayoade collaborated on the story with Harmony Korine’s brother, Avi, who appears to be as talented as Harmony. The originator of the plot, however, is Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky, who first penned his little novella in 1846, then revised it 20 years later. Back then the question to be asked was, Is the protagonist suffering from schizophrenia or is he being driven mad by the mindless bureaucracy of 19th century Russian social mores? Today, it might be more relevant to ask whether The Double is all about the search for identity in a social media-driven world, one in which humans live their lives in public and yet, paradoxically, lose their identities in the resulting clamour.
Screenwriters: Richard Ayoade and Avi Korine - adapted from Fydor Dostoevsky’s eponymous novel
Principal cast:
Jesse Eisenberg
Mia Wasikowska
Noah Taylor
Sally Hawkins
Paddy Considine
Chris O’Dowd
Country: UK
Classification: M
Runtime: 93 mins.
Australian release date: 8 May 2014
Even the press material supplied with Richard Ayoade’s second feature, The Double, describes it as, “a film that resists obvious commercialism, and genre categorisation.” You gotta hand it to the producers for honesty, that’s like admitting that it’s a hard sell and they’re right, which is not to say it’s not without its rewards. For starters, it’s a striking looking film, set in some kinda futuristic yet kinda retro, Kafkaesque nether world. The palette of colours chosen by the design team could best be described as ‘institutional,’ and the lighting and cinematography as ‘dank,’ but this all serves the story well. And what an odd little story it is.
Simon James (Jesse Eisenberg) lives alone in a run-down bedsit in an anonymous city. He’s so timid and repressed that he’s virtually invisible to the people around him; even his mother has trouble remembering him! He’s in love with a co-worker, Hannah (Mia Wasikowska), who lives across the way from him, but who also barely acknowledges that he exists. Acutely aware of his problem, Simon observes, “I’m permanently outside myself. You could put your hand straight through me.” Things look up for him though, when a new colleague James Simon (also played by Eisenberg), comes to work at the same drab company that employs Simon. James is everything that Simon is not, popular, amusing, attractive to women and a bon vivant, and he offers to help the hapless Simon overcome his identity problem in exchange for Simon’s assistance at work. There’s only one small hitch - James is Simon’s doppelgänger. Initially, their arrangement seems to be working well until, little by little, James begins to take over Simon’s life.
As is to be expected from a cast of this calibre, the performances on display are uniformly excellent: Eisenberg copes with the difficult task of playing dual roles exceptionally well; Mia Wasikowska is as nuanced as ever; the supporting cast of Ayoade favourites Noah Taylor, Sally Hawkins, Paddy Considine and Chris O’Dowd are all terrific in relatively minor parts; and veteran actors Wallace Shawn and James Fox, effortlessly bring their amusing characters to life.
Writer/ director Ayoade is probably best known as Maurice Moss, the awkward computer nerd in TV’s The IT Crowd and this script could have been written by that character. If Maurice was the poster boy for people who feel uncomfortable in their own skin, then Simon James is his alter ego. As it is, though, Ayoade collaborated on the story with Harmony Korine’s brother, Avi, who appears to be as talented as Harmony. The originator of the plot, however, is Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky, who first penned his little novella in 1846, then revised it 20 years later. Back then the question to be asked was, Is the protagonist suffering from schizophrenia or is he being driven mad by the mindless bureaucracy of 19th century Russian social mores? Today, it might be more relevant to ask whether The Double is all about the search for identity in a social media-driven world, one in which humans live their lives in public and yet, paradoxically, lose their identities in the resulting clamour.