This movie boldly breaks the 4th wall in a way I have never seen before, or could even imagine. It's been a week since I saw it and I still am freaking out about how it was done. It's twists are deeper than a Sixth Sense movie but it's story is more engaging. Adaptation, a filet minion, makes movies like Sixth Sense or Fight Club feel like a hamburger. It is just a smart, deep, BOLD movie that still has me rambling on. I don't think there will ever be another movie like this. 9/10PS>The twist is subtle, so you can't watch this movie in passing.
I spent most of the movie with the feeling that "this is indulgent crap." And even though it took a decided turn at the end, I was never really engaged at the same level that you were. The beauty of other twist movies is that they stand alone without the twist...they compel you towards a great story and then hit you with something unexpected (e.g., the Prestige, Sixth Sense, Shutter Island, Usual Suspects, etc). Would rather have a root canal than spending another hour watching the whiny, self-obsessed, arrogant Nicolas Cage character (pre-twist). Give me "The Box" and that annoying couple over Cage.
ReplyDeleteSPOILER ALERT! If you do not want to know the big twists before the movie, don't read this comment.
ReplyDeleteI have not seen "The Box" so I do not know what you are choosing over Cage but we both know that the twists in said movies MAKE the movie. The Sixth Sense is just another movie without the ending. The difference with Adaptation is the twist happens halfway during the movie where the writer becomes THE MAIN CHARACTER in the movie and consequentially reveals that the movie that he is writing in the movie is the movie you are watching! The director knew exactly how to direct it. The writer knew exactly what he was doing and it was genius to me. Not Hollywood shtick like The Sixth Sense and Fight Club (and I love that he makes fun of movie twists like Multiple Personalities as being the most cliche writing tool in Hollywood). Adaptation had more magic tricks in it than The Prestige (even though it was about a whinny writer who can't adapt a bad book!) The logistics and risk that it takes to write a movie about yourself adapting a novel and then make that movie where the character is writing the movie you are watching is mind-blowing to me! Not just a REVEAL A TWIST AT THE END MOVIE, but like I said, a smarter twist halfway through that kept me glued for the rest of the movie. It kept me up for hours after I watched it at 3:00 am to google Charlie Kaufmann and his brother. It probably just rubbed me the right way (because I DO have to forgive it for many things) but this movie bends conventional movie making and gets me really excited as a director, writer, and fan of movies! I am glad someone I know actually saw the movie so I could discuss it. Thanks Denny!
I did catch that the writer of this film was writing about his own life but did not find it mind blowing or even that interesting. When I say "self indulgent crap" I mean it that way. I did not find the writer's struggles at all interesting. If the writer is actually this self-absorbed (e.g., in a George Costanza type way) then I find it almost impossible to watch him whine and moan with the assumption that the world revolves around him. Eventually everything of interest that happens to him is made up (the action at the end, his twin brother). So it just played out as a writer's daydream fantasy to me. For me this was not a big reveal at all; just the arc of the storyline with the main character simply being the writer of this movie. I think I picked up on it pretty early in the film and certainly by the time he was on the set of "Being John Malkovich" (another movie that I was disappointed in and found a little tedious). Like I said, it did not become interesting at all for me until the narrative turned away from "self-obsession" and turned toward some action. I'm not a writer and not a filmmaker...so I was put-off with this movie about a boring writer trying to deal with his writer's block.
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