Zoe Kazan wrote and stars in this refreshing take on a romantic comedic drama. The story is that Calvin (Paul Dano) is a shy, slightly odd, basically good guy who wrote a widely loved book before he was 20, and hasn't been able to follow it up since. He is also reeling emotionally from a double whammy--his girlfriend of five years has left him and his father just died. Top that off with a profound lack of comfort with women, and you see where the pitfalls might lie with a guy like this as your romantic hero.
So here's what happens. His psychiatrist and his brother recommend that he just sit down and start writing. He decides to create 'the perfect woman'--for him--on the page. He has several dreams about her, and then a few good writing spells, and pretty quickly he has a few chapters hammered out, and he is pretty excited about the story.
Then it gets weird--a sort of 'Stranger Than Fiction' weird. One fine morning his fictional character is in his kitchen, making him eggs. Hmm. Initially he is appropriately concerned about his mental health, but once he verifies that everyone in fact can see her, he slips into enjoying her. Quite a lot. But then he finds out the fatal flaw in his fictional woman--he controls her. His brother eggs him on to figure it out exactly, which he does, and then when the relationship gets difficult, the temptation to 'fix' it is overwhelming. And a disaster, in a sort of 'My Fair Lady' kind of way. Women have a way of having minds of their own, which is very troubling for some men. Calvin has a great deal of trouble figuring his own feelings out, but in the end, he does, and he takes the experience and writes a spectacular story about it. And grows up a little in the process.
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