Too Creepy For A Comedy, Too Brainy For A Thriller

I thought this was a thriller. One of those identity twisters that's hard to follow and not very rewarding. Turns out it's a comedy directed by that comedy guy, Richard Ayoade. Comedy? Really? That's what IMDb says. You'd never know it from the trailer. The trailer is kind of creepy.

Catchy posters though. Well, they'd be catchy if the movie was one of those Euro try-to-figure-out-what's-going-on-we-dare-you thrillers. But, for a comedy? These are posters are, to say the least, weird for a comedy?

Somebody's not telling us the whole story. I'm going with: 'The Double' is one of those identity pseudo-thrillers with a comedic flare. Has to be.

So...some research is in order.

I just (now) checked the movie's Wikipedia page. Yeah, turns out it's based on a novella by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. So, after doing a double take thinking I had gotten the wrong film, this makes sense. Dostoyevsky had that downtrodden psych-existential thing going on and that fits perfectly with what I've seen in trailers. But, comedy? No way. Ole Fyodor was about as haha funny as, say, Shostakovich. I can just see Dmitri and Fyodor yucking it up over a beer or two. That would be a quiet party.

Here's a painting of Dostoyevsky done in 1872 by Vasily Perov.

Here's a bit about Fyodor from his Wiki page:

Dostoyevsky expressed religious, psychological and philosophical ideas in his writings. His works explore such themes as suicide, poverty, human manipulation, and morality. Psychological themes include dreaming, first seen in "White Nights",[135] and the father-son relationship, beginning in The Adolescent.[136] Most of his works demonstrate a vision of the chaotic sociopolitical structure of contemporary Russia.[137] His early works viewed society (for example, the differences between poor and rich) through the lens of literary realism and naturalism. The influences of other writers, particularly evident in his early works, led to accusations of plagiarism,[138][139] but his style gradually became more individual. After his release from prison, Dostoyevsky incorporated religious themes, especially those of Russian Orthodoxy, into his writing. Elements of gothic fiction,[140] romanticism,[141] and satire[142] are observable in some of his books.

Okay, maybe it's not fair to call the guy 'not funny'. How about his writing. Here's an example. This is the first line from 'Notes From Underground', written by Dostoyevsky in 1864. It's one of my favorite starts to a novel:

I am a sick man. ... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased. However, I know nothing at all about my disease, and do not know for certain what ails me. I don't consult a doctor for it, and never have, though I have a respect for medicine and doctors. Besides, I am extremely superstitious, sufficiently so to respect medicine, anyway (I am well-educated enough not to be superstitious, but I am superstitious). No, I refuse to consult a doctor from spite. That you probably will not understand. Well, I understand it, though. Of course, I can't explain who it is precisely that I am mortifying in this case by my spite: I am perfectly well aware that I cannot "pay out" the doctors by not consulting them; I know better than anyone that by all this I am only injuring myself and no one else. But still, if I don't consult a doctor it is from spite. My liver is bad, well--let it get worse!

Twig dry. Get back style. A tad depressing. But, funny? Not quite. 

So, no. It looks like 'The Double' is not comedic. Odd, maybe. Off-beat. Strangely introspective -- that might work. I'll say this movie might be "satirical portraiture with a caustic edge". But, comedy? That would be another genre entirely.