Adaptation. Review
by Karina Montgomery (karina AT cinerina DOT com)December 19th, 2002
Adaptation
Full Price Feature
Charlie Kaufman is a different sort of man than one usually meets. Besides having an obsessively self-deprecating internal monologue rattling constantly through his sweaty, balding head, he also happens to be an extraordinary new voice in Hollywood screenwriting. Being John Malkovich or Human Nature ring any bells? That's him. For those who might be scared off by these credits, Adaptation is vastly more accessible, without being at all pandering. He is also the lead character of this film, as well as the screenwriter.
Or should I say co-screenwriter? In a fascinating absurdity, Charlie shares his writing credit with Donald Kaufman, portrayed as his twin brother in the film, and dedicates the film to his late brother. Is Charlie real or is he a Dark Half sort of doppelganger of Charlie's id? Charlie, wisely, will not say. By the end of the movie, we can guess easily enough which sections were written by Charlie and which by Donald. Delicious questions persist: how much of the story is true, how much of the story is fiction, how much of the story is construct, or fictionalized truth. For all his avowed self-doubt, Charlie has some serious cojones when he's writing.
Nicholas Cage (channeling the spirit of Gene Wilder) plays the twins, and, real or not, they are completely unique persons, totally different but physically identical characters. What a feat! I am sure they even used the same hair piece for both Charlie and Donald, so alike are the brothers - but at no point do you ever wonder which is which. Nicholas is back, baby! Cage has fantastic timing with himself. As Charlie he's shlumpy, nervous, even irritating in his inability to connect. Donald is naively happy go lucky, unserious, and definitely shaped by different mutations than Charlie. Chris Cooper, one of Hollywood's great unappreciated, is marvelous as the subject of the book; off-putting and compelling all at once.
Patricia Waugh describes metafiction as "fictional writing which self-consciously and systematically draws attention to its status as an artifact in order to pose questions about the relationship between fiction and reality." (London: Methuen, 1984) That pretty much sums up Adaptation; and yet it is about so much more. The plot is basically about Kaufman having to write the screenplay adaptation of Susan Orlean's (Meryl Streep) book The Orchid Thief, which becomes the film we are watching. His theme of adaptation extends beyond adapting novels to species and individuals, orchids and screenplays, modes and methods.
It's about Kaufman, by Kaufman, yet it's the opposite of narcissistic. He was a nobody who became something doing anything to turn a book about nothing into a beautiful film about everything. It is easy in the first 2 acts to forget, to just watch it as a movie, but as Donald creeps more and more into the story, it becomes impossible not to be aware that this is a movie about itself. It doesn't feel forced, it is never confusing (a miracle in and of itself) and it is always engaging. I loved it - I got on the phone to tell everyone to see it right when I left the theatre. You will get your money's worth.
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These reviews (c) 2002 Karina Montgomery. Please feel free to forward but just credit the reviewer in the text. Thanks.
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