Synechdoche, New York (2008)
Directed by Charlie Kaufman
Written by Charlie Kaufman
Starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Samathan Morton, Michelle Williams, Catherine Keener
Release Date October 24th, 2008
Published November 7th, 2009
Some movies piss off as many audience members as they enchant. That was certainly the case with Fellini whose masturbatory explorations of his own wild mind kept him a cult favorite in America though a hero in Italy. Charlie Kaufman may want to see if the Italians find his work interesting. Kaufman's film Synecdoche, New York is rather Fellini-esque in the way the director goes all internal, walking around in his own weird imagination, but without Fellini's affinity for circus performers and other such absurdities.
Synecdoche, New York stars Philip Seymour Hoffman as a hypochondriac playwright trapped in a bad marriage. Catherine Keener, always Kaufman's idea of the castrating female, plays Hoffman's wife with the requisite disdain for the male gender. Keener's character has barely tolerated her husband for years but he has hardly noticed.
Together they have a daughter who carries equal parts of dad's hypochondria and mom's disdain. At work, Hoffman has a sweet flirtation with a box office worker played by Samantha Morton who, despite a mousy appearance, has an outward sexuality. The straight forward aspect of Kaufman's screenplay ends when Keener takes the kid and splits for Germany. She claims she'll be back but she never returns. From here Synecdoche, New York turns from the story of a sad sack writer into an exploration of this man's psyche.
We are never clued into the change of setting from the suburbs of New York City to Hoffman's frontal lobe but it's not that difficult to figure out if you are willing. Some viewers will not be so willing. When a seemingly random whim finds Morton's character purchasing a house that is on fire and will remain so for the next 40 years, many in the audience will get irretrievably irritated and give up.
It's not an entirely unreasonable reaction. Hoffman's character goes on to win unlimited funding to put on the play of his choice and begins a play in a giant stadium like building that becomes a play within a play within a play about Hoffman's life putting on a play within a play within a play. At one time Hoffman hires actors to play himself and another actor to play that actor playing him. You can see where some would grow tired of this. I did not. As I watched Synecdoche, New York I found myself becoming enrapt in Kaufman's endless self investigation.
The repeated ways in which Kaufman explores his fears, fantasies and obsessions is almost hypnotic in its oddity. I say his fears, fantasies and obsessions because the playwright is clearly a stand-in for Kaufman whose fascination with the exploration of the mind has run through each of his scripts, most obviously in Being John Malkovich where characters literally went inside the mind of the Oscar winning Malkovich.
Synecdoche, New York won me over with the ways in which Kaufman so nakedly explores his own mind. The honesty, hidden behind the play within a play blah, blah, blah, aesthetic is stunning and it stays with you long after you watch the movie. Indeed, even those who come away irritated by Synecdoche, New York likely won't be able to shake it for a few days. Some may even find themselves moving from baffled and disturbed to appreciating the movie. That's powerful work. Synecdoche, New York is a powerful movie experience.
