Prepare for the mind-melting 'I'm Thinking of Ending Things'
No Content for Old Men
with Matt Craig
Hey movie lovers!
I'm back after a one-week break. Fact is, I just couldn't bring myself to drop $20 on a THIRD Bill and Ted movie. And don't even get me started on a $30 price tag for a Mulan remake with no music. As always, you can find a podcast version of this newsletter on Apple or Spotify. Thank you so much for listening and spreading the word!
In this week's newsletter: A deep dive into the bizarre genius of Charlie Kaufman and his latest enigma, I'm Thinking of Ending Things. Spoiler alert: it's weird. Throw in some great streaming recommendations for your weekend and probably the most important "Trailer Watch" of the movie year so far with the star-studded Dune.
Word Count: 868 words
Reading time: 4 minutes
I'm Thinking of Ending Things
You're never going to appreciate, let alone enjoy, I'm Thinking of Ending Things if you don't first understand its writer and director, Charlie Kaufman. Well, perhaps "understand" is the wrong word. Kaufman is singular, the type creative genius who refuses to be confined by any box you'd want to put him in. He's one of the greatest screenwriters of all time not because he's played by his own rules, but rather because he set the rule book on fire and threw it out the window. If storytelling were like algebra, then a bad movie would be 4 = 4. A good movie would be 2 + 2 = 4. And a Kaufman movie would be apple + trident = walrus.
The skeleton key to unlocking Kaufman lies in the realization that he wields surrealism like a paintbrush. His stories explore the very specific nuances of the human experience -- the meaning of life, the inevitability of death, the value of connection -- NOT through the ordinary prism of indie melodrama but through fantastical chaos. His movies are abstract, meaning you as a viewer are going to have to use your own brain to search for meaning (which I know is an unheard of proposition in our loud, dumb superhero-saturated landscape).
Obviously, his work is not for everyone. Early in his career, Kaufman's scripts were balanced by the steady hands of more traditional directors and protected by the limited release of independent cinema. Spike Jonze turned the bizarre Being John Malkovich and Adaptation into cult classics that found a small but passionate audience. Michel Gondry softened the edges of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind into a legitimate $74 million hit.
The success gave Kaufman the latitude to become a true auteur, mounting the director's chair for Synecdoche, New York, quite literally the most confounding movie I've ever seen in my entire life. Cinephiles swear it's a masterpiece, and I truly want to agree with them, if only I could glue together the million pieces of brain matter scattered around my room after watching. Regardless, a $4.5 million gross against a $20 million budget sent the chronically reclusive Kaufman into a tailspin that has produced only a TV movie and a claymation feature (Anomalisa) in the last 12 years.
He emerges with I'm Thinking of Ending Things, a very liberal adaptation of Iain Reid's heady 2016 novel. In usual Kaufman fashion, anything happy or logical is disregarded as artifice and replaced by fatalistic philosophy. "Other animals live in the present, humans cannot," one character says, "so they invented hope." Needless to say, this is no barrel of laughs.
What's left is a story that couldn't be spoiled if one tried. The basic premise is a girl (Jessie Buckley) traveling with her boyfriend (Jessie Plemons) to meet his parents (Toni Collette, David Thewlis). The title refers both to her relationship, and her own life. The whole adventure is outfitted like a horror movie, from its tone to production design to the performances, relentlessly maintaining that gut feeling like something terrible is going to happen and then never allowing for a release as the movie continues to spin further from reality.
That mix doesn't exactly make for the most enjoyable viewing experience, and at a few different points it's as uncomfortable as I've ever been while watching a movie, but the effect certainly neutralizes any malaise that usually sets in while watching movies at home. Looking at your phone? Going to the bathroom? Forget it. You can't take your eyes off this movie for a second.
The tendency for a movie as head-scratching as this one is to approach it like a puzzle box. You want to "figure it out." And with the help of this YouTube video, or a million other explainers online, you can walk away satisfied that you've tamed some version of the chaos. But I'm going to warn you that attempting to apply logic is to reduce it to worthlessness.
Film critic Amy Nicholson, one of the sharpest minds in the industry and likely the world's preeminent Kaufman disciple, says the way to approach I'm Thinking of Ending Things is less like a movie and more like a painting. You go to a museum and silently stare, then reflect. "It stirs something in you, and it's individual and it's private," she says, personified by one character in a scene in which she asks us to "put yourself here and see what you feel."
This is not confusion for confusion's sake (something I have accused Stanley Kubrick of in the past). Everything you see on screen is a very intentional decision made by Kaufman.
Through that lens, the film is an incredibly rich text. It speaks to mental health, societal pressure, the defining influence of every movie/article/poem/song we consume, toxic relationships, toxic masculinity, bullying, fulfillment, regret, and loneliness, to name a few. Everyone who watches this movie will resonate with something different, and that something will stick with them in the days after viewing.
For that reason, the movie is an incredibly powerful work of art. I'd challenge everyone to give it a try, while realizing that a large percentage of you won't be able to overcome utter lack of narrative cohesion.
But come on. It's 2020. Embrace the chaos.
Streaming Suggestions!
Something New
Hard Knocks (HBO) and All or Nothing (Amazon): Behind-the-scenes documentary series are kinda my jam. After all, I did executive produce one in college for three years. But the usual delight of the NFL HBO staple "Hard Knocks" was dampened this year by the necessary focus on COVID-19 procedure, providing an equally fascinating but slightly less compelling experience following the Rams and Chargers. If you're looking for an even better entry into the genre, try out the surprisingly candid and entertaining "All or Nothing" series following the 2019-2020 Premier League season of the Tottenham Hotspur. It too grapples with the coronavirus, but only after enough real life drama to give the Kardashians a run for their money.
The Boys Season 2 (Amazon): This is the show for people (a.k.a. me) who do not like superhero movies. To borrow a quote from another big budget TV show, "The Boys" doesn't just want to stop the superhero wheel, it wants to break the wheel. It's bloody, irreverent, and way more compelling in grappling with what people with superpowers would be like if they actually walked among us. Thanks to a great ensemble cast and some old school TV writing, it's now a big fat hit.
Something Old
Being John Malkovich (1999): This is the script that put Charlie Kaufman on the map, because there's literally not another person on the face of the Earth that could've thought up a premise like this. A loser (John Cusack) finds a portal in his office into the consciousness of the actor John Malkovich, using it to hook up with the girl he can't score in real life (Catherine Keener), only to get cucked by his actual wife (Cameron Diaz) through Malkovich's body. It's pure insanity reigned in by the deft touch of director Spike Jonze, like a roller coaster with no handlebars that manages to stay on the tracks. Undoubtedly one of the most original movies ever made. Strap in.
Something to Stream
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Netflix): There are a few movies I find myself recommending in this newsletter over and over and over again. This is one of them, thanks to (in my mind) the greatest screenplay ever written. It's chock full of that signature Kaufman originality, and a healthy dose of his cynicism, but balanced by the romanticism of music video director Michel Gondry. The result is a bittersweet but deeply emotional love story between Jim Carey and Kate Winslet that raises a number of existentially massive questions about memory and attachment.
Trailer Watch: Dune
For years, I've been saying director Denis Villeneuve is just Coherent Christopher Nolan -- a comparison brought to center stage by the pair's dueling blockbusters this year. No one has scaled up their productions quite as successfully as the Frenchman, from small foreign-language films to indies (Prisoners and Enemy) to mid-budget (Sicario) to upper-middle (Arrival) to big budget (Bladerunner 2049) and now a mega blockbuster: Dune. Every single one of those is a banger. Which is to say i have supreme confidence that he'll be able to pull of this insanely ambitious sci-fi epic, especially with a cast must've cost the GDP of a small country to fund: Timothée Chalamet (this generation's Leo), Zendaya. Jason Momoa, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Rebecca Ferguson, Javier Bardem, Stellan Skarsgard, and more. Guys, blockbusters for adults!!!!