1856

Nutty. ( )

A puppeteer finds a portal into John Malkovich.

It's been quite a few years since the last time I saw it, and I'm surprised to find it's a lot darker and more serious than I remembered it. It's very funny, and absurd well beyond the point of silliness, but not a comedy. How does that work?

Concept: A
Story: A
Characters: B
Dialog: B
Pacing: B
Cinematography: B
Special effects/design: B
Acting: B
Music: A

Enjoyment: A

GPA: 3.4/4 ( )

Looking for a metacinematic experience to augment your appreciation of metafiction/postmodernism/experimentalism? Not really? Well then screw you, go play with some puppets why don't you, be a famous puppeteer, I wasn't talking to you was I? Maybe you're simply not interested in what I'd term, vicarious psychological spelunking: entering on your hands and knees a wall portal, a psychic tunnel or cave, situated behind the office Xerox machines inside your place of employment whose ceilings are high enough only for hobbits or little people, everybody who works there -- John Cusack's character, Catharine Keener's character -- are ducking and walking bent over all day long (why? why?) which leads somehow magically, mystically, into the mind of John Malkovich. You are John Malkovich, they are John Malkovich, we are John Malkovich, I am John Malkovich. It's pretty cool being John Malkovich! So what if you can't name one film he's acted in besides this, once you've been John Malkovich, and gotten dumped from the mind of John Malkovich onto the shoulder of a New Jersey Turnpike, you won't want to be anybody else. ( )