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You're reading a really old version of matt-thornton's website. For example, if you're looking at the movie reviews... you'll notice that none of them are of recent films. Indeed, I leave them here for posterity's sake, but I doubt very much that they'll get updated anytime soon. So have a giggle.
You might, if you're lucky, find something recent from Matt at his blog matt's debates. Kernow bys vyken.
Adaptation
the one line review:
a real mindbender
the overview
It's becoming ever more difficult to get a 5-star rating in these reviews. This film probably deserves a 5, Proof Of Life probably deserved a 5, and I'm sure several of the 5-stars probably didn't deserve them.
The point is - this is a good film, very good - but for some reason, it niggled me.
the plot:
This is almost too difficult to describe. Here's what Sean O'Connor at the IMDB had to say:
"A brilliant yet troubled screenwriter named Charlie Kaufman is hired to transform a book based on a true story about orchids into a script. Provided with an ample amount of time to complete a draft, the screenwriter struggles to produce so much as a sentence. Asserting the book contains no story and is awkwardly structured, the screenwriter determines that writing an adaptation true to the author's work is impossible. Consequently, he reluctantly deviates from his ingeniously unconventional writing style and stubbornly adapts to traditional Hollywood writing techniques. After gaining an understanding of old, yet valuable story telling principles from the highly regarded screenplay instructor Robert McKee, at last he begins to break new ground. Freshly inspired, he consults his twin brother and roommate Donald who recently sold a prototypical Hollywood script for a bundle. His brother helps by offering cliché ideas and by discovering new knowledge about the author of the book that ultimately leads to his own death. With the adaptation nearly complete, the screenwriter meets with the studio producer who hired him and confesses his love for her. After the meeting, Kaufman is seen pulling out of a parking garage voicing over the fact that him pulling out of the garage will be the last scene in the film."
Is that clear? No? Crikey. It's about a screen writer who's writing a screen play for a book. But the film is actually the script he's writing. Of the film. So it's a film about a guy writing the script, of the film that we're watching. In the script. Of the book. Of things that actually happened in real life (the book and characters exist).
My head just exploded.
the verdict:
Quite how Spike Jonze ever wrote this screenplay, I'll never know. He must be either a) extremely extremely clever, or b) extremely extremely stupid (and unaffected by the complexity) or c) a little bit (or a lot) mental.
Once you get passed the irony of the whole film and you try to enjoy it, it's really quite involving. It loses its way a little towards the end, but as the actual film and the writing of the screenplay (in the film) catches up with each other, suddenly everything becomes clear.
It's a bit of a mindbender, whose saving grace is the fact that it's clear (ish) from the start what is going on (unlike, say, Mulholland Drive).
Good value viewing. Oh and Judy Greer (Erin from What Women Want), you see her jubs. Job done.
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