CQ

Writer-director Roman Coppola, with famous father Francis Ford Coppola as executive producer, makes a rather dull debut here as writer-director. His film-within-a-film pokes at the conflicts and similarities of art and commerce with meager, superficial returns. It’s 1969 and a film editor (a lifeless Jeremy Davies) working on a cheesy science fiction spy adventure in Paris divides his time between the Barbarella-like project and filming his own life in search of truths that will give meaning to his future. Fantasy and reality begin to blur for the nerdy celluloid rat as his self-absorption alienates him from his live-in girlfriend (Élodie Bouchez). He then replaces the film’s fired director and becomes infatuated with his leading lady (Angela Linvall) in a visually ambitious but toothless production in which both Gérard Depardieu (102 Dalmatians) and Jason Schwartzman (Slackers) add another irritating performance to their resumes.