C/D -- Charlie Kaufman

I like synecdoche but it swings so hard and doesn’t quite hit. The artifice is too clear, distractingly. This did the same things in such a more primal (fuck I hate myself) Kafka way.

Synecdoche is much less dialogue dependent. The ideas he's interested in and returns to frequently are best expressed (imo) visually, with terse absurdist dialogue and as little speeches as possible. Someone or something is taking the piss out of PSH in every scene of Synecdoche. When it's two people just barfing out hyperlinks and suggestions of themes and ideas he's been working through--mostly through images--I wanted to put a fucking gun in my mouth. When illustrated--the always burning house, the fucked up floor in Being John Malkovich and the cave and the dream sequence, the bed on the beach and the childhood home set and all the disappearances in Eternal Sunshine--the stuff he's interested in is really compelling, to me.

When delivered in a car setting that reminded me of The End of the Tour (I was stunned when he actually mentioned DFW), with a pathetic D-level PSH clone gibbering in Plemmons, and again, this just struck me as ineffective and silly and immature compared to his prior work. I was really disappointed. Doesn't even approach the awfulness of Antkind though, Jesus Christ. I'm Thinking of Ending Things has a great case (Plemmons is very good, just given a shit role), the cinematography is particularly great, and like I said I enjoy when the film is freed from that fucking car.

No I don't relate to these sad fanboys who feel they have wasted their lives! I don't find them interesting. At least Caden spent the last 50 years of his life DOING something, even if he never opened the show... I mean, fuck, look at that set! Sets?

But that's really not the issue--it's being monologued at in the most boring fucking possible setting for a scene in a movie. There is nothing more dull than a car conversation.

How are those car dialogues not beautifully suffocating? It’s grueling and entrancing in equal measure. That’s when I immediately knew the movie was special, never felt quite that way watching a dialogue. Their looks, tells, everything, it’s one hundred things.

Those initial car scenes are so elegantly put together. I wish you guys could see what see in it.

Elegance of composition and detail are not the primary components of great art io, otherwise there are some amazing oil paintings of dead things that would qualify, e.g. this:

https://i.pinimg.com/236x/0b/44/16/0b4416711eb115118f1c908fc8e30973.jpg

They're just suffocating. Beyond what I've written in this thread I can only hold up Synecdoche as proof of what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about "elegant composition," I'm talking about images illustrated. This movie has a dearth of stuff Kaufman is dependable for--the ice cream stop goes nowhere--but for an example of what I'm talking about, the Betty Boop cartoons playing on the windshield to the janitor. That's beautiful--not dull car conversations that add up to nothing more than bad breakup riffs, pop philosophy hyperlinks, and relationship/loneliness territory that has been mined clean. The windshield shot is alone here--Synecdoche is filled with them. And these aren't paintings, they're moving images: the flower tattoo wilting and falling off of Olive's arm as she dies, the search blimps over the make believe city, the pink box... There's nothing in here half as compelling as any of that stuff. "A wife shaped loneliness"--come on. That shit sucks. That's just Adele in the first half of Synecdoche! "Everyone's disappointing the more you get to know them." THANK YOU! Excellent. ALL THATS' NEEDED!!! Her behavior says the rest.

Long story short, Kaufman is not Rohmer!

Elegance of composition and detail are not the primary components of great art

Who says? Of course they can be.

I think the car conversations in this were fine - exactly the kind of chat that two youngish, college-educated people who don't know each other that well might have on a long desolate journey together.

more paintings of dead things pls

the ice cream stop goes nowhere

this is the best part of the second car ride imo. actually hits the note of eerie lynchiness

the negative letterboxd reviews make me want to like this movie more bc they're just... too much. everybody seems to think that charlie kaufman thinks that he's better than them (or seem to have gotten their taste insulted by an imported pauline kael review) and i don't get that at all from this movie. they have this same complex about ari aster tho

ppl are extremely obnoxious about Ari Aster yes (not that there aren't legit criticisms or ehat have you)

I see flappy found it "astonishingly awful", but any other thoughts on Antkind? I'm really thinking I might be into a Kaufman novel that even hints at the same territory of Synedoche, but the reviews I've read are (unsurprisingly) divisive.

i am also curious about antkind, prob exclusively bc i heard the main character invents and gets obsessed with a gender-neutral pronoun, which could be and probably is obnoxious but i like the idea anyway

The gender stuff in Antkind is a thin joke played out over 700 pages. The character is a caricature of an over the top overcompensating "guilty white male," and a couple of the main characters are very similar to Sabbath's Theater. That's vibe--neurotic self sabotaging perv.

There are some really cool Synecdoche style images in it, lots of bureaucracy absurdism, the lost film itself and how it's described. If you're a fan of any one of his movies I'd say it's a necessary read. It has been really polarizing, like almost everything he's done (everything?). But my expectations were extremely high: this--and now the new movie--were the first new things from him since Synecdoche (the play Anomalisa had been out there for about a decade, I liked the movie).

Another really frustrating thing about Antkind is that it's always on the edge of getting interesting. He's dealing with film history, film's complicity in evil of the 20th century, how it lies and rewrites history in real time... and then five pages of self-cancelling worrying apologizing for being white or a man or looking Jewish while not being Jewish...

There's a lot in there and I may have skated over greater treasures. Not one I'm eager to revisit. I'm curious about others' thoughts though on the pronoun/white guilt stuff in the book, I just found it dysfunctional at a basic level (an unfunny joke played out throughout).

I'm weirdly more interested in Jim Carrey's Kaufmany-sounding book than Antkind.

I'm really thinking I might be into a Kaufman novel that even hints at the same territory of Synedoche, but the reviews I've read are (unsurprisingly) divisive.

I liked Matthew Spektor’s NYT review.

I'm curious about others' thoughts though on the pronoun/white guilt stuff in the book, I just found it dysfunctional at a basic level (an unfunny joke played out throughout).

My second quote is from flappy bird, not the NYT, if that's not clear.

Thanks! Sounds worth checking out at least.

its main purpose is to show how awful he is. It’s all fake; he’s a terrible human being!
― Cherish, Monday, September 14, 2020 2:17 PM (thirty-nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

hmmm yeah maybe i should stay away

It wasn’t very funny, true, but its main purpose is to show how awful he is. It’s all fake; he’s a terrible human being!
― Cherish, Monday, September 14, 2020 5:17 PM (thirty-eight minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I figured as much -- was beating a dead horse for me. But the book is obviously using repetition and accretion for something, idk what though. And I keep bringing up Sabbath's Theater, but I probably would've liked Antkind more if I hadn't read the former, because Mickey Sabbath is a very similar character--physically and mentally--and there's some overlap with the Tsai character in Antkind (certainly the soiled panties). So a lot of the self hatred perv stuff fell flat for me because I'd read another thick book about the same thing last year. I don't read as many books as I would like to... when will there be time enough at last... 😔

Antkind is often funny tho. I love when he asks Ingo if he's read any of his monographs and Ingo, without missing a beat, replies "Of course. It's on my nightstand."

Brad--and anyone else interested in this aspect of the book--read the first 30-40 pages if you can. The joke and its entire extent are played out by then

I completely forgot the thing about this movie that I liked the most: It references Anna Kavan's book "Ice" at least twice, maybe more than that; there's also a fair amount of it that has the same feel of that novel. I feel often like the only person who has ever read any of her books, she's really under appreciated, so it was nice to see that kind of very public mention.

great book, I perked up there too

found this almost exactly equal parts riveting and annoying, which is a neat trick I guess

at least it was an admirably impenetrable way to toss a few of Netflix's millions into a snowy trashcan

I definitely agree w/ flappy that Synecdoche was his peak and the ultimate iteration of The Kaufman Thing, this convinced me he'll never top it

something that occurred to me a couple days after watching:

when they're in the car and she notices the abandoned house with the brand new swing-set outside and he responds irritably, he's frustrated because she's noticing design flaws in his own imagination. despite her being a figment of his imagination (or whatever) she has agency which threatens to derail his fantasy. i've had similar things happen to me in dreams, where some part of my brain suddenly becomes aware that it's just a dream, while another part feels disappointed or annoyed that the ruse is up

one thing i didn't like about the ending was i felt like the build-up of layers of chaotic meta-psychological navel-gazery was just getting started; it would've been fun if it had continued to tie itself into knots for another 30 mins instead of just bursting into song

I definitely agree w/ flappy that Synecdoche was his peak and the ultimate iteration of The Kaufman Thing, this convinced me he'll never top it

― Simon H., Saturday, September 19, 2020 12:12 AM (eighteen hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

haven't watched any of them recently enough but i found the end of synecdoche dragged on foreverrrr. i think being john malkovich and adaptation are my faves

flops i'm with you on the ending

also thanks for reminding me about the swingset exchange, one of my favorite parts of the movie

i was totally waiting for like, the names from the credit of the movie set in the diner to show up as characters

one thing i like about charlie kaufman movies is they seem really fun to write. i saw or read an interview with him where he said the usual line about how 'writing is excruciating torture', which is prob true, but i like to think that i'd have a blast if *i* were writing a CK-style screenplay

one thing i like about charlie kaufman movies is they seem really fun to write. i saw or read an interview with him where he said the usual line about how 'writing is excruciating torture', which is prob true, but i like to think that i'd have a blast if *i* were writing a CK-style screenplay

Synecdoche is a great movie about one of my favorite themes: trying to determine the correct way to lead "the examined life" (and how you completely destroy your life when you fuck it up)

I wanted to love this but

same. by the time the Kael recitation started the roomie and I basically exclaimed "oh, come on!" in concert.

especially since the Kael review has sharper writing than Kaufman offers.

I wondered aloud if the movie was overlong on purpose as a supremely meta reference to the revie. I think that was when I really turned against it, lol

The horror-movie setup & lighting & camera-work made the first half of this weirdly tense. I watched this with my wife and she was sure a jump scare was coming any minute ("Don't go in the basement!" etc.)

I can see the ending of Synecdoche as dragging, but that last scene with the old woman? The slow fade to white? the in ear command to "DIE"?

https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/498/077/88e.png

Too on the nose

Maybe for you but it hit me in the gut! I was 16 when it came out but damn, still does!

Synecdoche is also his funniest movie

OTM

I love the overeager actor that doesn't age yet continues working with Caden thru Death of a Salesman up into Caden's 70s in the warehouse(s).

"I shall walk more... ambivalently."
"Yeah that's good, use that."

Jon Brion's score is perfect and I can't imagine the movie without it

i started antkind & im enjoying

found this almost exactly equal parts riveting and annoying, which is a neat trick I guess

― Simon H., Friday, September 18, 2020 11:57 PM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

at least it was an admirably impenetrable way to toss a few of Netflix's millions into a snowy trashcan

― Simon H., Saturday, September 19, 2020 12:07 AM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

More people should post about this movie because I'm not sure what I made of it but everyone so far otm. The Tulsey Town bit was my favourite, nearly leaned over into 'actually menacing' rather than flirting with it in an uncomfortable way. I liked Jessie Buckley's sort of drunk persona in the high school and the dumpster full of drink cartons was super-creepy to me.
All the lengthy quotations and reiterations of online opinions just remind me of that Little Britain (sorry) sketch where the romantic novelist is trying to fill pages: ""Do you know the Bible?" said Lord Harper. "No," said Geraldine. "I've never even heard of it." "Oh, it's really good. Let me read it to you," said Lord Harper. "Oh, OK then," said Geraldine. "Chapter One. Genesis. In the beginning God created heaven and earth..."'"