Meet Bill	by M. Faust

When Bill looks in the mirror, he doesn’t much care for what he sees: waxy skin, a gut that shows his addiction to candy bars, and a haircut that could only be improved were he to run a lawnmower through it (or maybe he already did).

Things only get worse when Bill goes from mirror life to real life. His wife is cheating on him—and with a guy named Chip. He works for his banker father-in-law, who dutifully created a useless executive position for him and has no clue that Bill might like a little challenge from his life. Bill’s in-laws display so little respect for him that when they take him out duck hunting (a “sport” he despises) and yell, “Get the duck,” he assumes they’re talking to him.

How adrift is Bill? The only salvation he can see in life is buying a donut store franchise.

Can things get worse for Bill? Of course they can, as for instance when the videotape he makes of his wife cuckolding him winds up on the internet and his co-workers get to hear the boss’s daughter describing Bill’s, um, shortcomings.

About all that doesn’t happen to Bill is for Mr. Hand and Sluggo to rip off his arms and turn him into a helpless pile of clay.

Aaron Eckhart, Elizabeth Banks in Meet Bill.

Did I mention that Meet Bill is a comedy? No? Well, I assume it goes without saying. Were it any other kind of movie, it would have to end with Bill climbing a tower with a rifle or maybe wreaking vengeance on his tormentors with an army of trained rats. And Bill would have to be played by Crispin Glover.

Instead, Bill is played by Aaron Eckhart, who like George Clooney is so preposterously good-looking that he needs to poke fun at himself on screen. His despairing frustration alternating with manic fits of vengefulness that always blow up in his face (like that videotape) are primarily what makes Meet Bill funny.

Something else I need to tell you: Although I laughed at it a good amount, Meet Bill is by any objective standard not a very good movie. It has a lot of funny moments, played to the hilt by Eckhart. But the script plays like a first draft desperately in need of revision by someone who knew what they were doing. It lurches aimlessly from scene to scene with almost no thought given to making any of it plausible, even though it clearly wants to be more than simply a comedy about the life of a loser. Scenes and characters make no sense at all, and the movie doesn’t so much conclude as simply stop.

It was directed by Bernie Goldmann and Melisa Wallack, from a screenplay by the latter. Neither has directed a film before, and it’s hard to understand how they got the go-ahead here. Even if it was simply that they were willing to work cheap in order to get the product made, you would think that someone would have pointed out the script problems to them. I enjoyed it despite its faults, but those faults are so glaring, and the strengths so promising, that you can’t help but wonder what Meet Bill might have become with just a little bit of professional polish.