Jeff Daniels plays Richard Dunn, a frustrated writer who, despite have a truckload of unsold copies of his first novel apparently has a contract and deadline with his publisher for a second. He and his wife Claire (Lisa Kudrow) rent a house in a small New England town for Richard to have the peace and quiet to write his book while Claire spends the weeks in Manhattan as a prominent surgeon. But Richard is a writer who seems to loathe writing, or at least loathe himself. He feels useless and unimportant and incompetent. Enter his imaginary friend, Captain Excellent (Ryan Reynolds). The Captain gives voice to Richard’s inner dialogue, but also gives him the occasional pep speech. “I am bolstered”, Richard says after one such speech.

Although shy (as one might expect of a middle-aged writer who can’t write and has an imaginary superhero friend) Richard strikes up a friendship with a disaffected high school student under the guise of hiring her to babysit his non-existent baby. Abby (Emma Stone) is able to share some of her problems with the less-mature-than-his-years Richard, and Richard finds in her someone he can talk to without pretense. He is painfully inept and uncomfortable in the world of successful professionals inhabited by his wife.

Paper Man is funny and affecting, though not terribly so in either sense. At times it seems to be trying too hard to be about quirky characters, such as when it forces Richard to ride a small girl’s bicycle into town. He doesn’t bother to raise the seat to more closely match his frame, or to borrow a bike from Abby, for that matter. And Claire’s character is short-changed a bit. She is a loving wife whose crime is to be be successful and uncomprehending of her husband’s incomprehensible behavior. Or at least incomprehensible to her. Unlike us, she does not get to see his dialog with Captain Excellent (nor does Richard share with Claire the doubts and feelings he shares with Abby). But both Richard and Abby are fully developed and interesting characters, and it is a pleasure to watch their relationship unfold.