SYNOPSIS: Calvin (Dano) is a young novelist who achieved phenomenal success early in his career but is now struggling with his writing – as well as his romantic life. Finally, he makes a breakthrough and creates a character named Ruby who inspires him. When Calvin finds Ruby (Kazan), in the flesh, sitting on his couch about a week later, he is completely flabbergasted that his words have turned into a living, breathing person. 

REVIEW: Real-life married couple Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, the directing-duo team behind “Little Miss Sunshine,” is at it once again with this whimsical romantic comedy that tends to stretch the imagination in ways that is rarely seen, beyond the Hollywood romanticized vampire/supernatural flicks. The idea of an acclaimed author being able to write about a love interest that takes shape as he invents her character on his vintage “Olympia” manual typewriter, is as unbelievable as it gets without actually being a children’s animated storyline. 

Nonsensically, as the neurotic wordsmith Calvin Weir-Fields (Paul Dano) and his real-life significant other Zoe Kazan (Ruby Sparks) characters embarks on this surreal journey of self discovery and a fictionalized relationship, he inadvertently becomes enveloped in the mystical event and uses his role to play puppet master and awaken inner demons that drive him to behave monstrously toward his new found creation. Well, as strange as this might seem, it works. The romance and comedy that follows this relationship seems to some how come together in a way that tugs at the viewer’s emotions and brings a certain level of imaginary significant to the roles.

I especially liked how Dano and Kazan bring fantastically fresh and innovative roles that are incredibly authentic and rich in substance. Moreover, Ruby Sparks is an utterly convincing, precociously delicate love story that is like the dreams that we have all encountered about meeting our perfect mate and the fear of waking and realizing that it was all a delusion. The married Dayton and Faris have been able to show how accepting the raw truth that people are different and we should not expect them to adhere to our fairy-tale ideals any more than that we should suit theirs.

I particularly enjoyed the off-the-wall romance between Dano and Kazan’s characters and believe that this would not have been so convincing if they were not already a real-life couple. I would recommend it as a beautifully written date-movie and for me, the enjoyment came in the form of how the fantasy, comedy and romance all culminated to override the obvious ridiculous premise of a writer bringing his perfect girl to life with a simple keystroke of a typewriter.

This movie definitely deserves four out of five stars for originality and substance.

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