So, I guess that you can see where this review is going.

Jeff Daniels stars in Paper Man as Richard Dunn, a writer who has come to a small community on Long Island in order to get some work done. He has rented a house, and his wife, Claire (Lisa Kudrow), who is a physician, will commute back and forth to visit him. Richard is a very nervous man, and he spends much of his time talking to his imaginary friend, Captain Excellent (Ryan Reynolds), a caped super-hero. While visiting town, Richard meets a teenaged girl named Abby (Emma Stone). For some reason, he asks her is she can babysit and she agrees. Arriving at Richard's house, she realizes that there is no child, but she agrees to stay and she makes soup. Meanwhile, Richard's writer's block is worsening and even putting all of the furniture outside doesn't help his process. Abby continues to visit Richard, much to the annoyance of her best friend, Christopher (Kieran Culkin). As Richard and Abby get to know one another, they realize that they have a lot in common, but will Claire ever understand what Richard has been up to?

Regular readers may wonder why Paper Man didn't have an "I've heard of these people, why haven't I heard of this movie?" introduction, and it certainly fits the bill. In fact, when I read the cast list to a friend, she responded, "Wow! That must suck!" Well, it's not exactly that much of a train-wreck, but the movie certainly has some issues, as it tries very hard to mix genres.

For starts, Richard is presented as the cliched writer who has rented a isolated house in order to work in his book. He's one of those writers which one only seems to find in movies -- the kind where their first book was a failure and they are now working on their second book. If their first one was a failure, who is going to publish the second one? As is common in these stories, the isolation begins to drive the writer mad, and so we get the furniture moving and the conversations with Captain Excellent. This is punctuated by numerous scenes in which Richard can't get past his opening sentence. Claire is cast in the role as "the sane one", but she's also the villain, as she has little patience for Richard's behavior.

This plot is then crossed with a "passing ships" sort of story where Richard befriends Abby. Their relationship is simply odd from the get-go, and I'm not sure how we are supposed to react to Richard luring Abby to his house under the pretense of babysitting, but it comes off as creepy. (Of course, she gets no points for actually showing up...I mean, he was riding a child's bike when he asked her. Did that look normal?) Obviously, Richard is lonely and has no social skills, but his interactions with Abby come off as very awkward at first. As they get to know one another, they realize that they are both lost souls, and a friendship is formed, although those around them don't understand it. The movie is attempting to make a point about how certain people (here an older man and a teenage girl) can't be friends in society's eyes, and this is a very good point, but it simply gets lost in the shuffle.

As one can guess from my introduction, the problem with Paper Man is that it goes too far out of its way to take itself seriously while never diving deep enough into the story. At first, Richard seems quirky, then he seems scary, then he seems sad. This progression makes sense in a narrative way, but it makes it difficult for the viewer to embrace him. Abby is actually more accessible, but I still have trouble getting past the fact that Emma Stone always has to play the teenaged girl who's wise beyond her years. We never learn the origin of Captain Excellent -- is he a creation of Richard's or is he a comic book character which Richard adopted? The middle of the movie really drags, as we watch Richard do one weird thing after another.

It's difficult to put into words, but Paper Man reminded me in some ways of Dan in Real Life. Maybe it's because they're both quiet films set in similar location. The difference between the too films is that Dan in Real Life had a ton of heart. Paper Man left me feeling as cold as the terrains depicted in the movie. It's got some interesting ideas, but the execution is wafer thin.

Paper Man gives us some new ideas on what we can do with a box of books on DVD courtesy of MPI Home Video. The movie has been letterboxed at 1.85:1 and the transfer is enhanced for 16 x 9 TVs. The image is fairly sharp and clear, showing no intrusive grain and no defects from the source materials. The colors look good, most notably Captain Excellent's costume, and the image is rarely too dark. The picture is notably soft however and lacks detail at times. The DVD carries a Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track which provides clear dialogue and sound effects. Again, this is a quiet film and we don't get many dynamic audio effects here. The light soundtrack does sound fine and there are a few stereo effects.

The Paper Man DVD contains only two extras. "Making of" (13 minutes) contains comments from the cast and filmmakers, who discuss the story and themes of the film. There's only a few moments of on-set footage, but the soundbytes from those involved do a good job of profiling the movie. There's also look at the location and why it was chosen. The other extra is the TRAILER for the movie.