“Unique”. The last word muttered in the ninety-three minute runtime of one of the most dull, yet unutterably infatuating films I have watched in a long time. Yes, Richard Ayoade’s THE DOUBLE is most certainly unique.

We all have a perception of ourselves: who we are, what we do. And yet we all have dreams and ambitions of what we want to be; and what, to our own agony, we are simply not. Simon James (Jesse Eisenberg) is an overlooked, under-appreciated office ghost who has been in the same job for seven years, lacking the charismatic charm required to push him to success. However, James Simon is not. James is fresh young blood with an enchanting personality which elevates him to a height that would make anyone’s head spin. James is Simon’s physical double, and his intimate opposite.

As the story meanders through an increasingly noir visual spectacle, its hard not to feel that Ayoade has spent most of his time making the film look good, and has subsequently allowed any real story progression to get lost in the dystopian world in which the lead characters are immersed.

We are all who we are for a reason, and we all have a place, so why fix what isn’t broken?

As James begins to crucify Simon’s morale by stealing the woman with whom he is infatuated, ruining his career and plagiarising his hard work, it becomes harder to sympathise with Simon: there is no fight or flight reflex ingrained in him. It becomes increasingly difficult to understand why Simon lets himself be walked over. A “normal” person wouldn’t let themselves be pushed around, would they? However, with a score so exquisitely executed, reflecting the submerged state in which Simon is so comfortably drowning, who’s complaining?

To say much more about the story without ruining the resolution would be a difficult task, but the message remains transparent throughout. What we should all be able to take away from THE DOUBLE is that we all have our inner demons. A deeper infatuation with a persona that we plainly do not occupy. We are all unique. We are all who we are for a reason, and we all have a place, so why fix what isn’t broken? This clear message and Eisenberg’s acting supremacy are the only two reasons that anyone needs to watch this film. I highly recommend this spectacle, although it could easily fall unrecognised into a vast archive of novel-screen adaptations.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XG8qATRtNuU