Dennis
Quaid is in this movie? Pretty sure he’s not in the trailer, but maybe
he is, for a moment. Turns out Quaid is the narrator of what turns out
to be a tri-layered narrative: the author telling a story about an
author who stole a story from a guy who wrote a story. (Got that?) The
top-most layer of the narrative is flimsy. Dennis Quaid is hardly a man
bearing a burden, but very much the aging celebrity revelling in the
attentions of a young beauty (Olivia Wilde). Whatever parallels are
intended between Quaid’s character and the wonderboy Bradley Cooper
plays are weak. What’s most interesting about the movie is the questions
it raises about responsibility in fiction. What does an author owe his
readers? What can the reader demand of the writer? Anything at all? Who
is responsible for the truth of the story? Does executive producer
Bradley Cooper owe us anything other than a diversionary entertainment?
Probably not.
Rory Jansen (Bradley Cooper) wants nothing more than to be a successful writer, but not until he finds a long-lost manuscript in an antique portfolio does he attract any attention. By passing the book off as his own, Rory is able to see his own two novels published and garner the acclamation he dreamed he would earn. He’s not entirely happy; there’s a guilty conscience beneath that polished exterior. (Really polished. Even as struggling-writer Rory, Cooper sports perfectly manicured hands. Ridiculously distracting for me.) Coming face-to-face with the award-winning manuscript’s owner tips Rory off balance and shakes up his life. But at what price honesty? Truth at what cost? And what does Dennis Quaid have to do with this? Moreover, what does Olivia Wilde have to do with any of it? And why is she smitten with Quaid? There’s a little too much going on here for anything to be fully developed. Maybe it’s meant to be ambiguous, but it feels more like Hollywood laziness.
** Bonus trivia: You might not recall Bradley Cooper from TV’s Alias, but it’s pretty cool to see him as a writer again, and in the same room as Ron Rifkin - if only for a moment.
Rory Jansen (Bradley Cooper) wants nothing more than to be a successful writer, but not until he finds a long-lost manuscript in an antique portfolio does he attract any attention. By passing the book off as his own, Rory is able to see his own two novels published and garner the acclamation he dreamed he would earn. He’s not entirely happy; there’s a guilty conscience beneath that polished exterior. (Really polished. Even as struggling-writer Rory, Cooper sports perfectly manicured hands. Ridiculously distracting for me.) Coming face-to-face with the award-winning manuscript’s owner tips Rory off balance and shakes up his life. But at what price honesty? Truth at what cost? And what does Dennis Quaid have to do with this? Moreover, what does Olivia Wilde have to do with any of it? And why is she smitten with Quaid? There’s a little too much going on here for anything to be fully developed. Maybe it’s meant to be ambiguous, but it feels more like Hollywood laziness.
** Bonus trivia: You might not recall Bradley Cooper from TV’s Alias, but it’s pretty cool to see him as a writer again, and in the same room as Ron Rifkin - if only for a moment.
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