But he fatally weakened the film by casting himself in the lead and doing a hammy, amateurish Huston impersonation, and his "self-reflexiveness" is canceled out by his unwarranted self-regard.
Whether you find it something more than that will depend on how you feel about the application of breezy charm and amusingly anguished authorial self-reflexiveness to a book about the Nazi security chief Reinhard Heydrich, who must be one of the most unfunny figures in recorded history.
And that the reporters on the Times's ramped-up Media Desk are assessing the viability of their own employer lends the film a pleasing self-reflexiveness and post-modern tang.
From Pikachu telling a Mudkip he rescues, "I believe all pokémon should be treated with respect... even Mudkips," to the OTT guts and gore of Mama stuffing a turkey, there's a definite self-reflexiveness to it all, and it hits the sweet spot.
Mr. Rohmer preferred to transfer this self-reflexiveness to his characters, and to maintain an illusion of transparency and detachment.
"Some risks that are especially difficult to control have three characteristics: autonomy, self-replication and self-modification.
Reid proved well suited to Martin's self-reflexiveness.
The self-reflexiveness of the season premiere, with its "changes" theme, continues in the Feb.
Fortunately, Meloy never lets the self-reflexiveness get too heavy.
This self-reflexiveness doesn't make critical writing secondary or parasitic, as critics of the critics have said for centuries: it makes it complex and fascinating and exponentially exciting.
