Paper Man

Impressions before seeing it
I thought it was interesting when it said it was about a writer with an imaginary friend, so I grabbed it during Amazon's Black Friday sale.

How was it?
Paper Man has some weirdness to it, but not in an off-putting way. It's sort of a Lost in Translation-type story about a middle-aged man (Jeff Daniels) bonding with a young woman (Emma Stone) over their mutual outsider aimlessness. I can only name a handful of movies that are about imaginary friends, but I'm not sure if this one even qualifies for that list because I felt it was more about the budding friendship between two people with issues. Or at least that's what I cared about most while watching this. Captain Excellent (Ryan Reynolds) is there, and he occasionally helps Richard with advice and/or moral support, but I don't feel that this movie would have lost much if he had been left out.

I really like watching characters just being friends on camera - when they're likable characters, at least - and Daniels and Stone turn in strong enough performances to have the required charming chemistry, so I had a good time. However, the biggest strike against Paper Man is that I found it largely predictable. I had already figured out the film's biggest reveal fairly early (at least I assume it was supposed to be a surprise when the reveal happened), and there were other things that I expected would happen, that did. So what I will say is this: on a story level, this movie is disappointing, but on a character (and acting) level, it is satisfying, and sometimes that's good enough.

Recommendation
Worth checking out if you, too, are into friendship movies, but maybe watch Lost in Translation first, because it is a better version of this movie.