Numb (2007)

So I have been not connected to power or film in awhile, I admit that I have been going to see many films in the last two years. As a summary I poit out Mary Steenburgen, what a great gal! This movie is one intense movie that actually is enjoyable. I had just seen INLAND EMPIRE by David Lynch, and totally wanted to assure that the actress i saw was in fact the very same one who plays a therapist in NUMB. so, Matthew Perry is a smart dude. I acknowledge his friendship with his buddy in a sort of NON fantasy role like Jack Black in Shallow Hal. The interesting and sexy person that Lynn Collins is makes this film a little more exciting as well as intriguing...if not a total bummer. But jump in Mary Steenburgen, and whallagh! awesome sentiment and compensation virtually arousing the males minds in this erotic thriller that insinuates that a mental illness is not to be taken seriously, and that DETACHMENT is a serious issue.

This is to the people that have smoked pot and your brain chemistry has changed into a depressed state. I was wondering if anyone tried coke to reverse the effects of what the pot did? If anyone has could they respond. Greatly appreciated. As far as the movies goes it was excellent. It shows how difficult it is on people to lead normal lives when they are not a hundred percent mentally healthy. It also shows that it can happen to anybody and it makes people feel that they are not all alone in there condition. Mathew Perry did and unbelievable job as he really committed to the role of his character. I was very impressed with him and he deserved a lot more attention for his performance than he received.

I picked this up on a whim after having only seen a brief trailer for it on another movie. I am SO glad I did. As one of the other commentators pointed out, depersonalization disorder is a real problem for some people. Unlike Perry's character, I smoked weed everyday for a little over two years before it suddenly flipped a 180 on me and threw me into a panic/anxiety disorder coupled with what I was calling dissociation (not feeling right in your own skin, as they say in the movie, is spot-on). I felt "out of pocket" for over two years after my incident and never really went completely back to normal. I eventually managed to get over the chronic anxiety (after six months on Lexapro and about a year spent seeing a psychologist). Anyway, sorry to go on about myself, but it is just such a relief to see this on film! I'm even a writer as well (fiction not screenplays), but this is uncanny. My doctor also told me there was nothing physically wrong with me, just like in the film. I had an MRI and multiple other tests which all yielded nothing, like in the film. I had read some blog entries of people experiencing this, but my doctor had no idea what was wrong with me and my shrink had never really heard of it either. I felt just as alone and helpless as Perry's character does.This movie did an amazing job of showing the effects of this little-known disorder. That whole part about looking at your hand or an object and not feeling like it's actually there, even though you can physically feel it -- completely true. I wanted to crawl out of my skin at times, and it is just so cathartic to see this film now, years after the fact. Perry is brilliant in this role and didn't even slip into Chandler-esquire tropes that have somewhat become his trademark (although, unfortunately, he will always be compared to that character). The dialog is actually quite good and the romanticism in this film isn't overbearing and contrived like so many other rom-comedies. In fact, I normally avoid rom-comedy for that very reason. Numb avoids the pitfalls and cuts right to the uncontrived truths. It doesn't rely on cuteness or sentimentality and the wittiness shines. Of course it's not perfection, but I couldn't have asked for more. Thank you Harris Goldberg. You did well.

I saw this at the Austin Film Festival and thought it was one of the best romantic comedies I have seen in years--and from the most unlikely source material. Beautifully written with a light hand, it exploits extreme situations for humor but always goes beyond simple shock value and superficial, quirky tics. (This writer has had enough of movies like Superbad and Knocked Up, which wear audiences out with shock humor, and I didn't see the point of Napolean Dynamite, in which minimalist, oddball moments fail to accrete to a real story.) Numb is instead an eccentric, hilarious film with depth, heart and soul. The tone was spot on: though based on deeply painful autobiographical material, Numb is never maudlin or pathetic. And Matthew Perry is outstanding--prevented from being outlandishly Matthew Perry ("Zero," the director reportedly commanded him. "Nothing. You're numb."), it seemed he was forced to funnel his comic genius into tiny, brilliant moments. A gem of film.