Contending with
terrible pain, boredom, self -
pity and a meddlesome sister who just may be out
for an inheritance, a wheelchair - bound cancer patient imagines a parallel world in which his world - weary alter - ego, L.A. gumshoe Rick Stone, searches
for the would - be killer of a blonde femme fatale.
Not a
terrible idea (i.e., making the boring, button - down dork the centre of a satirical romance)
for a movie as self - serving, self -
pitying, neo-Woody Allen ideas go, but as The Baxter unfolds with a suspiciously - familiar series of contrived situations, gentle misunderstandings involving homosexuality and a strange woman in your bed, and a parade of women so far out of Elliot's league as to render his eventual abandonment as inevitable as his ultimate match (with Cecil (Michelle Williams), likewise far out of his league) is unlikely, it becomes clear that the flick is just as stupid as that which it purports to lampoon.