I picked this up on a whim after having only seen a brief trailer for it on another movie. I am SO glad I did. As one of the other commentators pointed out, depersonalization disorder is a real problem for some people. Unlike Perry's character, I smoked weed everyday for a little over two years before it suddenly flipped a 180 on me and threw me into a panic/anxiety disorder coupled with what I was calling dissociation (not feeling right in your own skin, as they say in the movie, is spot-on). I felt "out of pocket" for over two years after my incident and never really went completely back to normal. I eventually managed to get over the chronic anxiety (after six months on Lexapro and about a year spent seeing a psychologist). Anyway, sorry to go on about myself, but it is just such a relief to see this on film! I'm even a writer as well (fiction not screenplays), but this is uncanny. My doctor also told me there was nothing physically wrong with me, just like in the film. I had an MRI and multiple other tests which all yielded nothing, like in the film. I had read some blog entries of people experiencing this, but my doctor had no idea what was wrong with me and my shrink had never really heard of it either. I felt just as alone and helpless as Perry's character does.
This movie did an amazing job of showing the effects of this little-known disorder. That whole part about looking at your hand or an object and not feeling like it's actually there, even though you can physically feel it -- completely true. I wanted to crawl out of my skin at times, and it is just so cathartic to see this film now, years after the fact. Perry is brilliant in this role and didn't even slip into Chandler-esquire tropes that have somewhat become his trademark (although, unfortunately, he will always be compared to that character). The dialog is actually quite good and the romanticism in this film isn't overbearing and contrived like so many other rom-comedies. In fact, I normally avoid rom-comedy for that very reason. Numb avoids the pitfalls and cuts right to the uncontrived truths. It doesn't rely on cuteness or sentimentality and the wittiness shines. Of course it's not perfection, but I couldn't have asked for more. Thank you Harris Goldberg. You did well.
This movie did an amazing job of showing the effects of this little-known disorder. That whole part about looking at your hand or an object and not feeling like it's actually there, even though you can physically feel it -- completely true. I wanted to crawl out of my skin at times, and it is just so cathartic to see this film now, years after the fact. Perry is brilliant in this role and didn't even slip into Chandler-esquire tropes that have somewhat become his trademark (although, unfortunately, he will always be compared to that character). The dialog is actually quite good and the romanticism in this film isn't overbearing and contrived like so many other rom-comedies. In fact, I normally avoid rom-comedy for that very reason. Numb avoids the pitfalls and cuts right to the uncontrived truths. It doesn't rely on cuteness or sentimentality and the wittiness shines. Of course it's not perfection, but I couldn't have asked for more. Thank you Harris Goldberg. You did well.