Being John Malkovich (1999)

From the ever-so-slightly twisted mind of Charlie Kaufman comes an incredibly inventive and innovative film which was also the feature debut of director Spike Jonze, previously a director of music videos and commercials. The result is a film that still feels incredibly fresh twenty years after its initial release.

Craig Schwartz (John Cusack) is a puppeteer who performs on a street corner in New York City. He is married to Lotte (Cameron Diaz) who works in a pet store, due to her incredible love of all animals. In fact, her love of animals is so strong, they have a veritable menagerie of animals living with them, including a chimpanzee, a parrot, a dog, a cat, an iguana, and many, many more.

As you can probably imagine, there isn’t a lot of money in puppetry, particularly in the incredibly lifelike - and at times a little risqué - marionettes Craig builds and performs with. Lotte suggests to him he find some more stable, paid work.

Craig (John Cusack), working on one of his puppet creations.

He answers a mysterious ad in the newspaper, calling for a short-statured filing clerk. Arriving at the building, he learns the company is on floor 7 ½ (which is reached by pressing the emergency stop button in the elevator between levels 7 and 8). The ceilings are low - low overheads, as everyone says - and the staff are all a little strange.

From receptionist Floris (Mary Kay Place), who can’t seem to understand what anyone is ever saying to her, to boss Dr. Lester (Orson Bean), who speaks and acts in an incredibly cryptic way at all times.

Craig also meets co-worker Maxine (Catherine Keener), with whom he becomes instantly smitten.

While trying to retrieve a file that has fallen behind a filing cabinet in his office, Craig discovers a small door that leads to a dark tunnel. Crawling through the tunnel, he discovers it is actually a portal that transports the ‘crawler’ into the mind of actor John Malkovich for fifteen minutes at a time, before spitting them back out beside the New Jersey Turnpike.

Lotte (Cameron Diaz).

Craig and Maxine quickly see the money-making potential from such a tunnel, and it isn’t long before they are selling tickets into Malkovich’s head to people who are unsatisfied with their own lives.

Everything seems to be going fine, until John Malkovich gets wind of what is going on, and shows up at their office, demanding they let him have a go. The results, of course, are at once fascinating and incredibly disturbing.

Charlie Kaufman’s screenplay is incredibly clever, with plenty of twists and turns throughout. All the characters are filled to the brim with both internal and external conflicts. I even find that each time I watch this film, I seem to notice new and different things every time, and it becomes even more incredible with each viewing, too.

Maxine (Catherine Keener).

The original score, by Carter Burwell, doesn’t have a lot to it. Music isn’t used much at all in this film, but when it is, it is near-perfect. The instrumentation is reasonably traditional throughout, but the music never overpowers the action, seeking only to support it, which it does well.

What really makes this film great, however, is the performances. Cusack and Diaz in particular are fantastic, as is Orson Bean as the eccentric Dr. Lester. All of the puppetry in the film is done by Phillip Huber who, as those who have seen the film can attest, is a genius in the truest sense of the word.

Director Spike Jonze, who has gone on to make several other equally-great films, has made a true gem here. I would definitely recommend this film if you haven’t seen it yet, and even if you have, check it out again; you never know what you might discover this time around.

8 out of 10.

Sweet Home Alabama (2002)

Melanie Carmichael's (Reese Witherspoon) life seems like it couldn't be any better. Her debut fashion show in New York City ticks all the right boxes in the elite world of fashion; she has just been proposed to by her boyfriend, Andrew Hennings (Patrick Dempsey), son of the Mayor (Candice Bergen); and everything seems to be going great for her.

The only problem is, her divorce from her childhood sweetheart, Jake (Josh Lucas), was never finalised, so she must return home to small-town Alabama before Andrew - and more dangerously, his mother - finds out that she isn't who she has been pretending to be for the last seven years.

Melanie Carmichael (Reese Witherspoon) at her fashion show.

Going back to where she grew up though causes more problems than it fixes, as the people she grew up with there haven't really moved on: Jake has been holding a candle for her since she left, her parents Earl (Fred Ward) and Pearl (Mary Kay Place) haven't changed at all, and her best friend Bobby Ray (Ethan Embry) is still keeping his own secret from everyone else.

And the longer she spends in Alabama, the more she comes to believe that maybe she made a mistake by leaving the life she once had, and so, as with any decently-written romantic comedy, she finds that she has to choose between the two men she loves.

Melanie with her new fiance, Andrew Hennings (Patrick Dempsey) and his mother,
New York Mayor Kate Hennings (Candice Bergen).

The screenplay, by C. Jay Cox, is a fairly standard romantic comedy, with twists in all the right places. There is a lot of history between all the characters, a lot of it being under the surface and 'hidden' as opposed to being revealed in large chunks of expository dialogue. I found as I was watching this (again) for the purposes of reviewing it, I was laughing one moment and wiping tears away in the next from beginning to end; this is such an emotional 'ride', but in a good, cathartic way.

George Fenton's score is very good, albeit traditional. The music does not at any point dominate or take over, but is used subtly to - no pun intended - underscore the on-screen action. Fenton's use of instrumentation to suggest setting is also good, while not descending into cliche, either.

I must mention the costume design of the film, courtesy of Sophie De Rakoff, which is absolutely fantastic. The contrast between the high-fashion world of New York City and the simpler life of Alabama - while not necessarily being the main point of the film - is done well. All of the ensembles from Melanie's fashion show are absolutely stunning, many of which Melanie wears in Alabama, where they definitely do not fit in as well.

Melanie's first husband, Jake Perry (Josh Lucas).

The performances of the cast are adequate for the film, but not necessarily ground-breaking. Witherspoon does very well as Melanie, and her two main co-stars Dempsey and Lucas both have great on-screen chemistry with her. However, the best performance in my opinion is from Ethan Embry as Melanie's best friend, a character who has a lot more going on under the surface than it seems at first.

Director Andy Tennant has made - as mentioned earlier - a fairly standard romantic comedy that, while not really breaking any new ground, is nevertheless an enjoyable way to spend a couple of hours. I do enjoy watching it, and would recommend it to you if you haven't seen it yet, purely for the experience.

6 out of 10.