Crowe called his last film (the disappointing Vanilla Sky) a "cover" of Alejandro Amenabar's Abre Los Ojos. Could the same be said of Elizabethtown? Was Braff's film really that influential, or was he just tapping into a larger zeitgeist in which disaffected twentysomethings fall for ethereal beauties while back in town for their parents' funerals? Both movies are clearly about the transition from the numbness and disillusionment of early adulthood to catharsis, courtesy of some chick who makes you feel alive and spontaneous again.

But the similarities don't stop with just the subject matter. There's something about the look of Elizabethtown that echoes Garden State as well (Braff's film, in turn, echoes HBO shows like Six Feet Under, in which framing conveys emotional despondency as lonesome characters stand forlornly in the center of wide-angle shots). It's not normal for actors to look the camera dead-on in movies, and yet we see that trick used in both Garden State and Elizabethtown. The same goes for shots in which characters gaze straight up into a camera positioned directly overhead (the shot of Orlando Bloom in the crowd beside the red balloon reminds me of Garden State's hamster burial scene, as seen from above).

So maybe Cameron Crowe's latest won't be as original as it could be. On the flipside, the preview definitely conveys the fact that Elizabethtown will deliver more of what the Jerry Maguire director does best (he's practically the only director who can make heart-on-his-sleeve sentimentality and gooey romance seem genuine enough to keep it from feeling corny), although if I were a studio exec, I wouldn't let someone with his sensibilities anywhere near a spreading-the-ashes movie (The Big Lebowski is the only entry in the genre I'd willingly watch again). Still, I'm sure Crowe will dig up a few poignant angles on the subject (the shot of Orlando Bloom imagining a smile on his father's corpse looks like it could be a tearjerker moment).

Crowe's got a great sense for the way real people behave, and there are hints amidst what otherwise amounts to a pretty nauseating montage that he's got his finger on the pulse. Take the shot where Orlando holds his cell phone outside the bathroom door while flushing. What's going on there? My guess: His stewardess/girlfriend (Kirsten Dunst) disapproves of chatting with him while he's on the throne. I haven't seen something like that on screen before (quite possibly for good reason), and yet it's the kind of observation about modern long-distance relationships that rings "so true."

Finally, a word about the music (another of Crowe's strong suits): It's usually a bad sign when a trailer depends on a pop song to get you interested (it always suggests they're overcompensating for something), but there's a certain poignancy to choosing Tom Petty's "Learning to Fly." It's clear that this is a movie about a young man who's sorting out the priorities in his life (the clips that suggest he may have something to do with a multi-million-dollar bankruptcy remind me of Paul Weitz's In Good Company, a great film from another director who's good with sincere human emotions), and the song will hit home with those brink-of-30-year-old males the movie's about. For another musical take (and a longer look at Elizabethtown), check out Crowe's internet-only trailer. He's even uncovered another classic Elton John song ("My Father's Gun") for the task.

So, if nothing else, at least we can look forward to seeing Orlando Bloom do something other than defend a castle for a change.

P.S. In 1960, Alfred Hitchcock argued an uphill battle with the censors to include the shot of a flushing toilet in Psycho at a time when all other movie bathrooms were commode-free. Forty-five years later, not only did the MPAA let Elizabethtown get by with the sound of a flushing toilet in the trailer, but they even let a shot of Orlando peeing slide. We've come a long way, baby!