Frank Leaves For The Orient

By James Poniewozik

Cross Ulysses with Herman's Head, and you might get this inventive "stream of consciousness," six-episode comedy. A thirtyish commitment-phobe takes a job teaching English in Japan and has three days to break up with his girlfriend, quit his job and sell everything he owns. But his friends, his family--even his stuff--are not ready to let him go before he harrowingly confronts every neurosis and shortcoming of his soon-to-be-former life, through the sometimes labored but often quite funny fantasy sequences in this mini-epic of indecision.

--By James Poniewozik