Pity the artist who falls in love with his own creation. This is another take on the Greek Pygmalion myth, which inspired George Bernard Shaw. The artist in this case is Calvin (Paul Dano), a one-hit-wonder novelist with lots of acolytes, but no friends unless you count his dog (prominently featured), his brother (a wry Chris Messina), and his shrink (Elliott Gould). I’d thought maybe the writer’s block plot was inspired by the attempts of the film’s directors, Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, to follow up their six-year-old hit, Little Miss Sunshine (whose zany tone is no guide to this). But no, it’s a first screenplay by the doll-faced lead actress, Zoe Kazan; her eponymous character springs fully formed (well, almost) from Calvin’s imagination, just as he wrote her, and, after the expected how-did-this-happen-is-she-real-am-I-crazy machinations made-to-order girlfriend.
Somewhat funny in predictable ways, the movie takes awhile to get to the more interesting part, where Calvin gets to a dark place and realizes he cannot have the perfect girlfriend when he himself is a narcissistic child. Compare a movie like Adaptation for a more original, twisted take on writer’s block. (Although, as plots about blocked writers whose stories come true go, it certainly beats the hell out of Alex & Emma, which succeeded only in convincing me that the main character was a hack.) Barring that, it would’ve been fun for Kazan to write more bizarre character transformations for herself. All Calvin has to do is type it, and Ruby becomes it, which is too much power for anyone, but Calvin’s a little too nice to truly exploit this plot point. Still, it’s fun when he/Kazan does. Not a gem, this Ruby, but a reasonable first effort for its 28-year-old screenwriter.
viewed 7/9/12 7:30 pm at Ritz East [PFS Screening with directors and stars in attendance] and reviewed 7/9/12
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