2011 · adventure · comedy · sci-fi
Paul
Directed by Greg Mottola1h 44m2011
For the past 60 years, a space-traveling smart-ass named Paul has been locked up in a top-secret military base, advising world leaders about his kind. But when he worries he’s outlived his usefulness and the dissection table is drawing uncomfortably close, Paul escapes on the first RV that passes by his compound in Area 51. Fortunately, it contains the two earthlings who are most likely to rescue and harbor an alien on the run.
Our read: Paul (2011) reads as a warm, breathless, inventive adventure · comedy · sci-fi entry — gentle in intensity, epic-stakes in scope, measured in temperature, redemptive in outlook.
Warm, breathless, gentle adventure / comedy, inventive in texture. Redemptive, epic, measured.
- warm
- kinetic
- gentle
- inventive
- epic-stakes
Watching Paul tonight? Spin for your lens.
Everyone on the couch spins once and gets one craft to watch for. After the credits, compare what you caught.
Your lens for tonight
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Everyone on the couch gets one craft to watch for. Spin the wheel to get yours. Sound on: the narrator reads your mission.
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How Paul feels to watch.
Each axis is scored by hand, not from votes or genre averages. The bar uses the film's own colours.
What watching it is actually like.
“You want Pegg-Frost road-trip nerdery with a foul-mouthed alien.”
Skip it tonight — Stoner sci-fi banter and juvenile jokes will wear thin fast.
Eight films that feel like this one.
Closest in the twelve-axis space, not “people also liked”. All films like Paul, with why →
Discussion
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Pick a mood, get a film the whole couch will enjoy, and give everyone something to watch for.
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