Having just sold his first screenplay, a young writer heads out of LA just to get a break from the world of show-business, and get out into the real world. Problem is, as much as he says he is tired of the world of LA, he also cannot stop himself talking about it.
I'm not in "the business", but I think is all walks of life there are people who can always get the conversation back to themselves no matter what the subject is; people who almost forcibly want to tell you of their success and project this image of everything being tremendous. I have learnt with such people to try not to extend the conversation, and look for a way to end it without too much time passing. One can only imagine what it is like in the entertainment industry, particularly LA, where image and success is everything - but this film manages to take the narcissism that we will recognize and show us that in LA terms by way of this writer character who is out with the "real people".
As a character he is endless terrible, with such dull learnt conversations and talking points, all about the industry, all about the success he (says) he has, and so on. It is a nicely written piece because, although the character is obvious, he is written is such a way that we understand why he is this way, and it is convincing that he has come from a certain place where this is the norm. In this way he reminded me very much of Alan Partridge – the comedic monster who has no self-control when it comes to success; he is either a mess in a trough, or a star at its peak who should be exalted, nothing in between. The character in Sold is similar, because there are elements here where we do feel like he doesn't want to be this way – but that side is not as clear, and ultimately as a contained comedic character piece, it is not such a big deal that it doesn't find the person as well as Coogan always did with his creation.
Sold is quite funny but mostly engaging because of how terrible this person is, making the viewer glad that (for most of us) we are not in worlds where this sort of name-dropping, image-centric bullsh*t is the norm.
