I couldn’t help the comparison, but in watching the first 10 minutes of the honoured Sundance film I couldn’t help but think of Being John Malkovich and wonder if I wasn’t seeing some kind of thematic spin-off. Fortunately that wore off. Still, it’s about an off-kilter, though talented actor basically playing himself in a metaphysical comedic drama that explores issues of identity and talent and the things that basically make you the person that you are. In Cold Souls the actor in question is Paul Giamatti has he stumbles and puffs and furrows his brow in frustration trying to wrap his head around Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya. Then he stumbles upon an interested method to change his mental state and recharge his creative juices.

The meaning of the film’s title basically means the cold storage of people’s souls. An unorthodox business on New York’s Roosevelt Island offers customers the chance to get their soul extracted and held by the company at either their New York office or New Jersey warehouse, while they get to walk around a while soulless. The inventor of the process is Dr. Flintstein (David Strathairn), but just don’t ask him how it works. Paul goes into the clinic with rather cynical, but desperate expectations as to Flintstein’s services and to his chagrin Paul discovers that his soul, once extracted, is no bigger in shape and form than a chick pea, but even without it, he still can’t reach the levels he thought he was going to as both an actor and as a person.

Cold Souls is by no means some Kaufman rip-off, and is much more liner and atmospheric than anything by the Master of the Mind Trip has cooked up. Writer/director Sophie Barthes creates an interesting vibe that reminded of a film noir version of an early Woody Allen film, as if the dank rain soaked atmosphere of Blade Runner was married to the bizarro trip offered in Allen’s Sleeper. And now we’re just throwing out all kinds of references because it seems that Barthes is just taking in so much. It’s an inspired gumbo of different filmmaking styles and story ideas, but somehow working together to create a wonderful, realistic wonderland where people’s souls are as easy to extract and store as your average appendix.

At the centre of the drama (and humour) is Giamatti, and I’ll take a pass as to whether he’s a man playing himself straight up or is otherwise filling the shoes of a severely exaggerated variation. Either way, the man is good. One might think that playing yourself is a walk in the park, but Giamatti makes playing Giamatti look like a master class in discomfort. Strathairn looks like he’s having a good time as a kind of absent-minded professor version of Dr. Frankenstein (name hint taken Ms. Bathes). His kind of addle-nerves, mad scientist soul sucker is a little off his nut, but you’ve got love how the smoothly uninformed Flintstein plays off Giamatti’s jumpiness. Russian actress Dina Korzun is interesting playing a “soul mule,” someone that sneaks valuable souls cross borders by carrying them within them.

And that’s where things get a little dark for our ordinarily whimsical film. It sneaks you in as a kind of low key comedy about an actor’s struggle with his art, but then it hits you with a subtle jab with the larger metaphysical quandaries. What is a soul? Why does it matter? What does my life look like through the eyes of others? It kind of rocks your world to think about it. How would I be different with someone else’s soul? How might someone else be different with mine? Cold Souls gets you thinking without either smacking you over the head with its message or getting you so into your own mind that you lose track of the movie. And a lot of that credit goes to an actor willing to take the mickey out of himself in order to pursue grander truths, such as not focusing on superficial comparisons.