The Movie
Richard, a stressed-out writer, rents a house in a remote Long Island village so that he can be alone to work on his new novel. Well, his doctor wife comes to visit on weekends, but other than that, he's all by himself. Except for his imaginary superhero friend, Captain Excellent. But really it's about concentrating and working on the book. Although he does spend a lot of time riding around town on a child's Schwinn bike. And that's how he meets the local girl with whom he strikes up an unlikely friendship.
Yeah, it's another one of those would-be-funny little personal dramas to come out of The Sundance Institute, only this one is so self-consciously wacky (did I mention the superhero? in tights? played by Ryan Reynolds?) that it keeps reminding us that we're watching A Sundance Movie.
There's not much in the way of plot, it's really just Richard's path of self-discovery, coming to the conclusion that he's a "Paper Man," flimsy and insubstantial. Enough already with lovable, immature middle-aged losers on film. And why do they always seem to be writers? [editor's note: because editors are far less interesting]
I must however give props to Emma Stone, who plays Richard's platonic young friend. She's the only member of the cast who doesn't appear to be trying too hard to find the scraps of nuttiness in it all, opting instead for a heartfelt, surprisingly nuanced performance.
Also, flip on over to David Kempler's review of Paper Man.
The Picture
Shadows are alive with substance in the 1.85:1 image, which shows a pleasing level of detail overall, despite a low-ish bitrate, typically ranging from only about 16-19 megabits-per-second. Out of focus backgrounds and foregrounds look sufficiently natural, and the interesting color palette of Eastern Long Island in winter is well-represented here. I noted a very faint flicker in some shots, but overall MPI did a fine job.
The Sound
The music--both the helpful original score and the in-scene tunes--are the only aspect of the DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack consistently mixed for 5.1. There's also the occasional atmospheric effect, a dramatic whoosh or something similar or just a bit of chatter at a party, but even off-camera voices and environmental effects seem relegated to the front channels, although they can convincingly fill the soundfield. The quality, from bass to fine details, is quite good.
The Extras
"The Making of Paper Man" is your usual overview of the movie, the characters and so forth, with lots of interviews. It runs about 13 minutes. There are also eight handily chaptered deleted scenes, about six-and-a-half minutes all-told. Both of these extras are presented in an extremely low bitrate AVC, more akin to SD than HD.
Final Thoughts
While it's rather tempting to dismiss Paper Man as a paper movie, without much to it, the underlying pathos and a couple of solid twists save it from being a total wash. That's much the same diagnosis of the picture, sound and extras: not great, but not terrible either.
Product Details
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