Synecdoche, New York

Synecdoche, New York (which is a mouthful, so I'm going to call it S, NY from here on out) is the directorial debut of acclaimed screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, scribe of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Being John Malkovich, and Adaptation. S, NY stars Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Caden Cotard, a dejected, hypochondriacal theatre director who, after winning a MacArhur "genius" grant, decides to "do something important while" he's "still here." This "important" thing he decides to do is create a enormous stage play about his life.

S, NY is the type of film that caters to a certain crowd. More specifically, to the type of crowd that enjoys thinking about a film experience long after its over. S, NY does not offer up a beginning, middle, end or even a very plotcentric story. What it does offer up is layers, layers of information and insight into vast ideas of life and death, reality and truth. Now, that being said, I can't say that I always understood any of these layers or if they're all even meant to be understood. Take, for instance, Hazel's burning house. Hazel is a character, played by Samantha Morton, who serves as an on-again, off-again love interest and theatre assistant to Caden. Hazel's house is always on fire and smoky, yet she still lives in it, still has visitors, without anyone mentioning the fire happening around them. What does the fire mean, symbolically? Is it a representation of the passion that Caden only felt toward Hazel? Is it a sign of the danger of constantly falling in love with a person like Caden Cotard? The movie gives you no solution to this symbol and, unless you could crawl inside of Charlie Kaufman's head, I don't think you could ever find it's true meaning. The film of situations like this, situations that leave you scratching your head, trying to make the connection.

Another example of S, NY's depth came up when I reread the NY Times review of the film. In the review, Mahnola Dargis (who I'm not a big fan of, but that's neither here nor there) brought up the significance of the main characters last name. So I googled Cotard and it leads me to Jules Cotard, French neurologist who is best known for first describing the Cotard delusion, a patient's delusional belief that they are dead, do not exist or do not have bodily organs. In the film, Caden Cotard seems to suffer from his delusional namesake, at least in reference to the existence part. But, like I said before, I could by mistaken by this significance as well; the film never even mentions the connection.

The acting, on the whole, was very well done. PS Hoffman does a great job as usual, although Kinsey mentioned that he seems to be stuck in a rut of playing overly pathetic characters. The cast is filled with actor's actors, like the beforementioned Samantha Morton, Michelle Williams, Emily Watson, Dianne Wiest (she of Edward Scissorhands fame), Catherine Keener, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Hope Davis. It's hard to go wrong with a cast like that.

Overall, I would recommended seeing it, but only if you're in the mood to think and ponder. If you want a "comfort" movie, you should probably go see the Madgascar sequel.

Kinsey: 2 stars

Wade: 2.5 stars