Review of Cold Souls (2009) by Niklas S — 27 Jan 2010

It seems to be trend to play yourself in movies. John Malkovich did it a couple of years back and Bruce Willis did it in that stupid movie with Robert De Niro recently. The time has come for Paul Giamatti to do the same and if I have anything to say then I say that he did a better job than both those dudes.

So Paul plays Paul an actor that has a hard time coping with life and this bleeds into his acting career. He reads an ad in a newspaper about how people can part with their souls and store them in a little box somewhere. After some thought, Paul goes to this "clinic" and extracts his soul from his body. Life is a lot easier now, but (yes but) some Russians have started a business where they sell Russian souls to Americans and steal American souls and sell them to Russians. Well, Paul's soul gets stolen and he has to go and look for it.

This is a coming of age tale as well. Paul learns about life and how to live it by traveling through Moscow with a blond Russian woman who he soon falls for.

I can't really explain why I liked the movie but I did. It seems that I have a weakness for Paul Giamatti. Not the kind of weakness that Girl has for Downey Jr. I don't think anyone has that weakness for Giamatti. This movie was well-played on all parts and, most importantly, it's something I haven't seen before. This is a plus when you have to watch five movies a day.