A black comedy based on a novella by Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Double is a thrilling yet lucid parable on contemporaneity whose cutting-edge technology enables people to create a myriad of identities.
Simon James is a timid office clerk. He is overlooked by his boss and colleagues, scorned by his mother, and ignored by Hannah, the lovely girl he pines for. Undermined and undervalued everywhere he turns, it seems that his life couldn’t get any worse until the arrival of James Simon, his new co-worker. James is both Simon's exact physical double and his opposite: confident, charismatic and seductive with women. To Simon's horror, James slowly starts taking over his life.
»Yes. People don't merely read Dostoevsky because he's like cod liver oil or something. He's an incredibly popular writer, and his work doesn't feel like it's aged. I think that's a feature of a genius writer. He was interested in what makes people tick, and that's the same as it ever was – in some ways, he's the opposite of what films seem to be interested in, which is just stimulating your neural sensors. So his books feel completely contemporary, the concerns feel contemporary. The humour feels contemporary.« (Richard Ayoade)
Richard Ayoade
Born in 1977 in London, Ayoade studied law at the University of Cambridge. He has written TV scripts and directed music videos, among others for the Arctic Monkeys and Yeah Yeah Yeahs. In 2008, he directed a live Arctic Monkeys DVD, At the Apollo. The Double marks his second feature.
filmography
2004 AD/BC: A Rock Opera (TV movie)
2008 Arctic Monkeys at the Apollo (documentary)
2010 Submarine
2013 The Double