This dramedy chronicles the carnal escapades of Hank Moody, a self-loathing, alcoholic New York City novelist who attempts to repair his damaged relationships with his daughter and her mother while combating sex addiction, a budding drug problem, and the seeming inability to avoid making bad decisions.
It acts like it wants to tell the story of Hank's comeuppance, his growth from obnoxious man-child to real man, but it can't bear the thought of the audience not liking Hank (and, by extension, Duchovny) right out of the gate.
Duchovny turns in a fabulously wry, cynical performance as Hank, a Los Angeles-based writer with a particularly active sex life, in this adults-only pay-cable series that packs brilliant humor, wild sex, and poignant moments into each half-hour episode
He [Duchovny] delivers a tousled sort of aw-shucks Huck Finn, lighting out for erotic territories. McElhone, manages to convey the notion of adult womanhood without being either drippy or schoolmarmish about it.
Never mind the cliches, because Duchovny makes his character worth watching, as he swaggers from bad predicament to bad predicament, pretending not to care about his life anymore.
Sometimes sweet and wry, sometimes crass and vicious, and, though often subtle, it embraces that embarrassing title and flings itself boisterously into a hacky premise.
Duchovny has some nerve taking shots at TomKat. Were anyone else starring in Californication, the reference to a "crappy romantic comedy" might well have Duchovny's name on the receiving end. He's definitely got that one coming.
