Adaptation is underrated. I'm glad the author of this piece felt the same way about the third act as I did.

The movie that got 90% on rotten tomatoes? And got a nomination for best writing? And was on many best of lists? That was underrated? Or do you mean that it's underrated by the fact that most people think that Being John Malchovich was a better film? Well, guess what. Adaptatio nwas a great film, but Being John was oh so much better.

yeah, dude, you're crazy if you think adaptation is underrrated.

BJM is fantastic, but Adaptation is incredibly layered -- and a much more literary feat. i'd venture to say that comparing them is useless because BJM is a brilliant take on comedy, celebrity, gender and isolation -- but Adaptation is a disgustingly perfect analysis on writing, storytelling, biography, autobiography, criticism, celebrity, gender and isolation. they're different exercises.

but that third act goes from confusing (first viewing) to clever (second viewing) to brilliant (third viewing) to god-damn-him-he's-such-a-fucking-genius-i-want-to-kill-him-and-eat-his-brain-to-gain-his-power (all subsequent viewings).

for me it was predictable (first viewing), clever (second viewing), and brilliant (third viewing). i say predictable because the first time it was completely clear to me what was happening and i found it to be student-film-like. The second time I saw it, I was able to appreciate the craft in setting up the third act, rather than harping on the fact that it relied on a tired grad-student cliche. The third time, I found it brilliant, since he somehow manages to take an idea that is a film- and grad-student cliche and makes it funny, relevant, and resilient to criticism.

yes, but it's more than that. he brilliantly managed to adapt to the screen a nonfiction book by relying on the concept of the narrative of the book and applying it to the process of writing the movie.

orleans' book is as much about her as it is about the cooper character -- at least from the bits n' pieces of narrative we get from the film -- and so, kaufman imports himself into the orleans position and puts her into the story itself. it's like drawing a square and then turning it into a cube.

this is what i mean by significant layers -- there's already the awesomeness of "donald" writing the "wow them in the end" ending, once his character joins the writing process. there's also the genius of charlie acting as the narrative voice from the novel as he becomes as involved in, or obsessed with, his subject as orleans did with hers. and then the brilliantly conceived notion of both charlie kaufman and susan orleans grieving over their dead narrative creations ("donald" and "laroche.")

christ, i got to watch that shit again. awesome.

Oh, well then, I guess I watched it with people who didn't enjoy it. I remember people not liking it, but maybe my memory is faulty. I know somebody keeps telling me they didn't like it. Who was that?

remember when we saw it at harvard square and that douchebag after the movie said to me, "you laughed in all the right places," because he was a pretentious harvard douchebag?

remember that, guys?

i actually don't. but he sounds like a douchebag.

I remember that. Are you sure it wasn't your brother?