Sundance review: Karen Gillan takes charge in 'Dual,' a deadpan comedy about a woman's struggle with her clone

The idea that someone has to be dying to appreciate what it means to live is a Hollywood trope that goes back to “Dark Victory” — but writer-director Riley Stearns takes it to absurd lengths in his dark comedy “Dual.”

Set in the near future, the story starts when Sarah (Karen Gillan) throws up blood one night, and is ultimately told she has a rare terminal illness and will die soon. She is offered one option, “replacement therapy,” in which she is cloned, and then trains the clone to live out her life after she’s gone.

Not that Sarah’s life is going that well, otherwise. Her boyfriend, Peter (Beulah Koale), is away on business and inattentive in their FaceTime calls. And she’s made an art of avoiding calls and texts from her mom (Maika Paunio). But Sarah goes through with the cloning, and starts training her double in what she likes and doesn’t like.

Ten months go by, Sarah hasn’t died yet, and she learns that her double is living her life better than she is. Peter enjoys the double’s company more, and the double is much more attentive to Sarah’s mother. Then Sarah is told that her supposedly terminal illness is in remission and she’s not going to die. 

Normally, she’s told, the clone would be “decommissioned” — but here, the double demands to remain alive. In such cases, the solution is a televised duel to the death between original and clone. Sarah has one year to prepare, and hires a trainer (Aaron Paul) to get her ready.

In some ways, “Dual” follows some of the contours of Stearns’ last movie, 2019’s “The Art of Self-Defense,” another story of a lonely character finding purpose through personal combat. Stearns’ comic style here is deadpan to the extreme, and some of the humor is bone-dry.

Gillan, known to many for her stint on “Doctor Who” and her role as Nebula in the Marvel franchise, throws herself into the double role — the jaded Sarah and her inquisitive double — with relish. She locks into Stearns’ droll wavelength, while deepening and humanizing the two Sarahs as they go through this odd experience.

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‘Dual’

★★★

Premiered Saturday, January 22, in the U.S. Dramatic competition at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. Screens again on the festival portal, Monday, January 24, for a 24-hour window starting at 8 a.m. Rated R for violent content, some sexual content, language and graphic nudity. Running time: 94 minutes.