Synecdoche, New York (2008)

I have been editing and thinking about the post for this for 11 days and tonight I had the bright idea of deleting it and reposting my draft with today's date but I forgot to copy the text first. Argh. So here goes, a fresh start (maybe with a little less of my usual OCD detail). Many critics have called Charlie Kaufman's directorial debut a masterpiece, but they have all said they didn't quite get it and need to see it again. I liked it a lot, but will probably wait for the DVD for re-viewing. Kaufman bent time and reality as the screenwriter of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), Adaptation (2002), and Being John Malkovich (1999), as well as entertaining (me, at least) with the Chuck Barris story Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002). This movie begins in Schenectedy (which rhymes with synecdoche--sin-ECK-doe-kee, Skin-ECK-ta-dee--see my post on Changeling for a definition), where depressed Caden Cotard (Philip Seymour Hoffman, Oscar winner for Capote (2005)) is directing a stage production of Death of a Salesman. He has a mean wife Adele (Catherine Keener, who was nominated for Capote (2005)) and a cute daughter Olive (Sadie Goldstein, the brat in Little Children (2006)). They move to New York City, where most of the movie takes place, and Caden begins directing a play-that-never-ends about himself, where scenes play out after they have occurred in his life, featuring doppelgangers of the characters.

Sounds simple, right? Wrong. Time is not linear and some details do not make sense. For example, there's a house that is always on fire but never burns down (Jack says that "The woods are burning" is an oft-repeated line from Death of a Salesman). Wonderful actresses dominate the movie: Keener, Goldstein, Michelle Williams, Samantha Morton, Hope Davis, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Emily Watson, and Dianne Wiest. Hoffman's performance reminds me of the desperate character he played in the twisted Todd Solondz movie Happiness (1998) and the whole doppelganger conceit owes something to Woody Allen's Deconstructing Harry (1997). Somebody on Wikipedia thinks he/she has the whole thing figured out (and has published lots of spoilers). There are plenty of laughs in this, but mostly from schadenfreude.