5. Cold Souls
The top five on this list are all doubtlessly the most self-conscious of the bunch, but Paul Giamatti's portrayal of himself in Cold Souls is by far the weakest. This is mainly down to the fact that it doesn't offer anything new to the conversation, and is effectively just Being John Malkovich with a different star (and less surrealism). Even the promotional imagery mirrored the earlier and superior film. It arguably tries to be too clever for its own good. Where BJM just gives up on any real conventionality and basically just becomes nonsensical - in a good way - Cold Souls attempts to legitimise its self-conscious by basing it around the fact that Giamatti is struggling to separate himself from his roles. This is about as meta as actor studies can possibly get - an actor playing an actor who can't escape from the fact that he's an actor - but it tries to make sense of ideas that were rendered illogical in the glorious mindf*ck that was BJM. It's not bad, by any means. Giamatti is great, the humour is often very good, the premise is an interesting one. But it's not the smartest or most innovative film on this list - ironically because it tries to be too clever and sensible.