The Double [Blu-ray]

Director: Richard Ayoade, Juliana Rojas

Overview

Richard Ayoade's stylized adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky's novella The Double stars Jesse Eisenberg as Simon James, a meek office drone who bumbles his way through his day, forever pining for a pretty girl (Mia Wasikowska) who lives near him and working hard for a boss (Wallace Shawn) who doesn't see any of his accomplishments. One day Simon discovers that he has a new co-worker, James Simon (also Eisenberg), who looks just like him and possesses all of the confidence and charisma that Simon lacks. Simon befriends this new person, and soon the put-upon man is asserting himself. However, he begins to fear he's becoming just another pawn in James' relentless self-interests. The Double screened at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival.

Product Details

Release Date:	08/26/2014
UPC:	0876964007047
Original Release:	2013
Rating:	R
Language:	English
Time:	1:33:00
Sales rank:	37,037

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Jesse Eisenberg	Simon/James
Mia Wasikowska	Hannah
Wallace Shawn	Sr. Papadopoulos
Noah Taylor	Harris
Yasmin Paige	Melanie
James Fox	O Coronel
Craig Roberts	Jovem detetive
Paddy Considine	Jack
Sally Hawkins	Ju?z
Chris O'Dowd	Enfermeiro
Cathy Moriarty	Kiki
Phyllis Somerville	M?e de Simon
Kobna Holdbrook-Smith	Doutor
Tony Rohr	Rudolph
Susan Blommaert	Liz
Jon Korkes	Detetive
Tim Key	Staff Member
Lloyd Woolf	Actor
Lydia Ayoade	Actor
J. Mascis	Janitor
Chris Morris	Actor
Gilda Nomacce	Actor
Majeca Angelucci	Actor
Sabrina Greve	Actor
Henrique Rabelo	Actor
Daniel Ribeiro	Actor
Sara Silveira	Actor
Helena Albergaria	Actor
Marco Dutra	Actor
Kierston Wareing	Actor
Andrew Hewitt	Composer

Technical Credits

Richard Ayoade

Avi Korine

Richard Ayoade	Screenwriter
Avi Korine	Screenwriter
Amina Dasmal	Producer
Robin Fox	Producer
Nigel Williams	Executive Producer
Graeme Cox	Executive Producer
Tessa Ross	Executive Producer
Michael Caine	Executive Producer
Douglas Aibel	Casting
Karen Lindsay-Stewart	Casting
Robin C. Fox	Producer

Editorial Reviews

Simon James (Jesse Eisenberg), the hero of Richard Eyoade's comic thriller The Double, is a spineless, toothless, whimpering corporate drone. He's trapped in a menial job at a ghoulish company that looks born out of some Kafkaesque nightmare. The world that we see here seems eternally bound to the vaccuum-tube technology of the 1950s with the vague hum of machines suspended in the air. We never learn what functions this business performs, and Simon himself may scarcely know. Amid all of this bleakness, a source of hope arises in the form of Hannah (Mia Wasikowska), a copy girl within the company, for whom Simon yens - though he can barely summon the moxie to speak with her. Then Simon's doppelganger materializes. Called James Simon (Eisenberg again), he seems to possess all of the qualities Simon James lacks, including confidence, suaveness with Hannah, a flair for business, and an ability to make enormous strides at work. Before long, James seems poised to take over Simon's life. This picture may have been adapted by Eyoade and Avi Korine from Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel of the same title, but it finds more recent pop culture antecedents in Terry Gilliam's sci-fi comedy Brazil, Michael Radford's Orwell adaptation 1984 (the brilliant production design by Joseph Crank echoes both movies), and - in its premise - the 1946 Walt Disney cartoon short "Donald's Double Trouble," where Disney's stuttering, tongue-tied mallard has his love, Daisy, stolen by an identical twin, and must wrest his life back. This is a fun conceit with an enormous amount of comedic and dramatic mileage to be tapped from it. Unfortunately, Eyoade's direction - reportedly so satisfying in his cult hit Submarine - here comes across as maladroit; he seldom sets up and delivers his gags effectively on camera, so we're forced to look beyond the sophomoric execution and laugh solely at the concepts on display, which is a lot to ask of an audience. For example, an opening scene has Simon struggling to leave a subway car to greet Hannah, but he repeatedly gets immobilized by oncoming passengers, each one carrying an enormous brown box onto the train. A funny idea, though the dramatic blocking and the facial reactions from Eisenberg don't ring true - there are enormous gaps left in-between the actors, so that anyone (confident or not) could easily stroll in-between the men, and Eisenberg pantomimes very broadly here; nothing about his response to the situation feels credible. Nor are Eyoade's visual storytelling skills up to par; one of the central story motifs, for example, involves Simon watching Hannah through a telescope in his apartment, and observing how each evening, she ritualistically draws an illustration, tears it up, and throws it into the incinerator. On a nightly basis, Simon races down to the boiler room to retrieve the scraps of paper before they burn. Again: it's an inspired concept,, although the shot choices are so poorly done that we initially have a difficult time ascertaining what is going on. Nor is the narrative here ideally conceived; it's irritating, for example, that Ayoade and Korine waffle between enabling the supporting characters to discern between Simon and James, or not, depending on the needs of the scene at hand; the twists in the story seem born out of convenience. And if the setup and initial stages of the picture feel awkward and disappointing, the conclusion strikes one as so overwrought and complicated that the film becomes totally hopeless. We get two Eisenbergs running around and switching places and experiencing different fates, and cannot tell who is who; it's about as clear of a denouement as the finale of Andrzej Zulawski's Possession, with its multiple Sam Neills all suffocating and wreaking havoc on Isabelle Adjani. The Double is a particularly disappointing film because it seemed so full of promise and surely must have looked like a dream project on the page. Eisenberg and Wasikowska do what they can, but the execution is too poor to send the movie aloft.