The Double – DVD review
An office drone’s sense of being a ‘non-person’ is reinforced by the arrival of his exact physical double
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Richard Ayoade, 2013
Studiocanal
Loosely based on Dostoyevsky, Ayoade’s follow-up to Submarine casts Jesse Eisenberg as office drone Simon James in a nightmarish setting reminiscent of Eraserhead.
Toiling away for an opaque organisation, Simon’s sense of being a “non-person” is reinforced by the arrival of his exact physical double, James Simon. Unlike Simon, James is confident and a hit with the girl (Mia Wasikowska) Simon loves from afar.
Clever production design serves up a dystopia that could be the 1930s or the future. Eisenberg pulls off the two roles with verve in a film that is, for all its visual panache, otherwise anticlimactic.
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