Thursday, July 2, 2009

As a Directorial Debut, Just Not as Good as "Blood Simple"

Written and directed by Charlie Kaufman, "Synecdoche, New York" is the most disorienting and disconcerting movie that I've seen since "Eraserhead". Yeah, yeah, that one's a cult classic. C. K. wrote "Adaptation" (o.k.), "Being John Malkovich" (good), and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" (lousy, and ruining our great physical comedian, Jim Carrey). Syn... is loaded with good actors, but it still got ruint. Roger Ebert said "See it twice". I wish I wouldn't have seen it once. This is a story about a paranoid who spends about 100 years filming in a New York City replica. Touchingly stupid. The film seems to be 100 years in length. Even Philip Seymour Hoffman didn't save this one for me.
Speaking of which P. S. H. is my new fave actor. Good gosh, Jack Nicholson and Dennis Hopper are as senile as I am. Philip is never brilliant, just great. Effective is his modus operandi. I guess his first major flick was "Boogie Nights". I don't remember him, just Burt and the girls. This guy is in his early 40's, so we hope to see much more from him. Can you imagine the same person playing Truman Capote and a parish priest (no, not in the same movie) equally effectively? Philip pulls off anything that he tries.

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