Bob Bowlsby | My Journey So Far….

Those filmmakers who say that there is a dearth of good and original stories, should watch the Movie, ‘The One I Love‘. On second thought, they shouldn’t; else they will copy this one too and make it into a joke.

“The One I Love”, directed by Charlie McDowell and starred by Mark Duplass, Elisabeth Moss, and Ted Danson, is a drama movie with comedy in its background. It is a short budget film, with only three actors (Yes, only three), and a vacation compound consisting of two houses and a pool.

Spoilers Alert – There is no way to talk about this movie and not divulge its story, and believe me if you want to enjoy this movie, you should not have any slightest idea of what this movie is all about prior to watching it. So, if you are interested in watching this movie, do not read further, as it may change your watching experience.

“The One I love”, starts with two couples, Ethan and Sophie, continuing their therapist session to help their dull marriage. They feel that there is no more a spark in their married life and it just seems without any excitement. Their therapist acknowledge that there is no more any harmony between both of them, so he advised them to go on a small vacation to a secluded estate.

They started enjoying each others company the moment they stepped into their cottage and having fun. Till, their dry season ends and they had sex in guest cottage. Problem unfolds when Ethan declares that he didn’t even stepped in guest cottage last night. Who the hell did Sophie sleep with?

At first you think of it as, Ethan is still under Marijuana effect from last night, or, maybe it was just Sophie’s dream. Comes another twist, Ethan went to guest house where he met Sophie, who is just not the same Sophie, he left in his cottage. Is he dreaming? Or, is he under the influence of some drugs? Or, is there some ghostly presence?

Story unfolds and Ethan and Sophie realize that as a matter of fact there are two Ethan and two Sophie, one set of them lives in guest cottage and others are they. This point forward lets use real Ethan/Sophie and Fake Ethan/Sophie to distinguish between our actors and their doppelgangers.

As they step into their guest cottage, they see their fake spouse in his or her best behavior. Like when Ethan goes inside guest house he saw fake Sophie cooking him, his favorite breakfast of egg and bacon. She actually looked perfect homemaker wife like 50’s. Always ready to please his husband.

Whenever Sophie step into guest house, she met fake Ethan who do pushups, paints and also talk about emotions and feelings with her. She falls in love with this perfect husband, who seems to understand him more than her real husband.

At this point you will feel the underlying idea of this whole story. We are always looking for perfection in our loved ones. We are always looking for more. So more that we sometimes start loving a totally different person from the one we started to love. In this search for a perfect spouse, what we are losing is the real person behind that mask of perfection.

We want to have fake Ethan and fake Sophie in our lives but we forget that these fake ones are only fooling us into believing in something which is not real. Life is dull with a person, with whom you can not fight because you have no differences. Instead we always seek out the one, who is just like us. We are not ready to change ourselves yet we seek out the one who will change himself as per our needs.

Enough about this philosophy, lets return back to our movie. Now, this movie could have gone to somewhere else with this philosophical point, but instead it goes sci-fi way. I guess, director wanted to explain more of why this strange doppelganger things came into effect rather than focus on human psychology.

End is good, but whole second half looks too much compacted and forced. There is a great story lost in an science fiction novel fixation. Although you will enjoy the logic too along with the irony in it.