“Self/Less”

Self/Less is a long, slow slog with a disappointing capper in its “Directed by” credit. It’s hard to believe that Tarsem Singh, the same visual stylist behind The Cell, The Fall, and even the utterly silly Mirror Mirror, was behind the camera for this detached, distant, and forgettable sci-fi thriller that owes an unwieldy debt to the John Frankenheimer film Seconds. Tarsem’s previous films are qualitatively spotty, but their distinctive design and striking imagery were enough to define him as a director to watch over time. Self/Less, on the other hand, is disturbingly anonymous and lacking in vitality or intrigue.

Ben Kingsley sets the mood by sleepwalking through his role as Damian Hale, a powerful New York businessman who maintains a sharklike attitude even though cancer is rapidly destroying his body. He’s pointed to an enigmatic British doctor named Albright (Matthew Goode, doing his best attempt at a Jeremy Irons impression) who’s invented a way for older people to have their minds placed inside of fresh young bodies built in his laboratory. Though Damian is slightly hesitant, he wants more time on Earth, so within minutes, his mind is swapped out and put inside of a younger model (Ryan Reynolds). Unsurprisingly, Damian’s perfect new body comes at a cost: he has to take an ominous red pill once a day or else he’s thrust into hallucinations that suggest this body belonged to someone else before he took over the reins. As Damian gets more curious about his body’s origins, Albright and his goons chase him in the hopes of keeping their methods secret.

The core premise of Self/Less isn’t inherently dull, but the execution is. The script, by Alex and David Pastor, doesn’t explore what it’s like for an elderly man to live life in the body of a young hunk except for a brief montage in which the young Damian goes partying in New Orleans for an extended period of time and ends up with a different woman in his bed each night. But even this orgiastic roundelay has a dark side—soon after Damian does some sleuthing, he discovers that his new partying bro Anton (Derek Luke) is really just working for Albright and is willing to kill our hero (as well as the family of the man whose body Damian’s using). The twists in the script are all quite similar, too: once the possibility is introduced that one person’s mind can be shuttled into another person’s body, the possibility that many of the characters in the film are not who they seem compounds. If the script utilized this switch once, it might be legitimately surprising; the more often it goes to this well, the more uninspired the twist feels.

“Uninspired” is a good way to describe the performances, as well. Reynolds doesn’t do a magical job of impersonating Kingsley’s mannerisms, but then, the script doesn’t seem to want him to. With the exception of a late scene where the new Damian reunites with a business partner, the younger character doesn’t seem remotely connected to the old man at the start. And though Reynolds is no stranger to action sequences, the scene in which he’s most natural features him teaching a little girl with a severe case of the cutes how to swim. Kingsley is billed second here, which only proves that he’s got a good agent; though the elder statesman still has lively performances in him, his extremely brief work here (and especially his Noo Yawk accent) is laughable. Of the ensemble, only Goode leaves unscathed; his oily and unctuous work feels entirely apt even if the movie he’s in doesn’t try to match him.

Tarsem Singh hasn’t previously proven to be flawless, but he’s made constantly fascinating pieces of cinema with daring risks and visual panache. Self/Less is neither risky nor memorable to look at; even the intentionally disjointed editing in some sequences, jumping back and forth in time, falls flat. And the ways in which this script refuses to engage with its own premise are simply enervating. Self/Less is just tired; it’s a direct-to-DVD knockoff that inexplicably got a few big names attached.