THR: Whether in his screenplays for Being John Malkovich, Adaptation and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, or his directing debut, Synecdoche, New York, Charlie Kaufman's surreal, cerebral chronicles of despair, obsession and failure are like nothing else out there. So it was a given that his first animated feature, Anomalisa, co-directed with stop-motion specialist Duke Johnson, was going to be another idiosyncratic entry in a small but wildly distinctive body of work. However, that doesn't nearly do justice to the beguiling poignancy and emotional nuance of this funny-sad, haunting meditation on depression, disguised as a melancholy love story.
FGE - Anomalisa is a picture that personifies the rational palette, allowing viewers access to the intricate qualities of the human condition. Quality which is often buried by the conveniences of modern life, Facebook and interpersonal politics. Anomalisa continues Kaufman’s legacy of forcing us to see the big picture.
CGM Writes: Good news folks, 2015 is finally over. Bad news folks, that means you’re going to have to suffer through a variety of “year in review” articles. In fact, you’re reading one right now. I’ll do my best to make it as painless as possible. This article will be all reverie! You see, I like movies. That’s why I’m a film critic! I know that most folks of my ilk tend to be a lil’ whiney and pissy about movies. You might even start to think that film critics hate them. But nope! We don’t. We just love em’ so much that we hate when they are bad. That sentence makes sense, right?
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At this point, Charlie Kaufman could almost be a sub-genre to himself, and Anomalisa is unmistakably his voice. However, it doesn’t feel like a retread or a fresh coat of paint on old ideas. His collaboration with Johnson, the stop-motion animation, and most importantly the heartbreaking characters and story make the themes feel new and immediate. Anomalisa is as effective and compelling as any of Kaufman’s movies. Let’s hope we don’t have to wait seven more years for his next film.
