Anomalisa (2015)

[Plain Old Tele]

Discuss.

[Blankments]

Anomalisa is a confusing film in the best sense. Throughout the entirety of watching it, I tried to figure out what it meant. Does it even matter what means? After all, we're watching it from Michael's perspective, and he can't find meaning in anything. He tries and he tries, but he sees the same faces and hears the same voices. But then he meets Lisa, and everything about him changes. But it doesn't too. Michael's a fascinating character, but he is not the key to Anomalisa. That is Lisa and Lisa alone.

 

Kaufman and Johnson direct it wonderfully, and the three voice actors do their job splendidly. Tom Noonan is a standout in one of the most unique roles I've ever seen in any picture. The third act is riveting, and I'm not saying that to demean the first two acts, which are fascinating in their own right and compellingly watchable. But once Michael gets a phone call to meet someone in the basement of his hotel, the film becomes intense, surreal, and terrifying. It's also startlingly real.

 

It's not until the very end where the film shifts to view Lisa's - and Kaufman's - view of the world, as beautiful in its complexity and gloriously detailed. Michael doesn't realize this, and that is just tragic. Lisa sees the world as it should be seen, and I see Anomalisa as one of the most evocative, heartcrushing and horrific films of 2015, but also one of its most beautiful. A

[Joel M]

I liked it a lot but I won't deny I was somewhat dissapointed by the smallness of its ambitions, considering Kaufman's other scripts. Maybe that's what he needed after something as expansive Synecdoche, but I felt a little letdown when I got where the movie is going.

 

Anyway the acapella rendition of girls just wanna have fun is one of the most emotional scenes of the year. Jeniffer Jason Leigh's comeback needs to keep going.

[BadAtGender]

Eh.

 

It's certainly a well made film, but the more I think about it, the more I don't think I like it at all.

 

In a lot of ways, it feels like the culmination of Charlie Kaufman's career, as it's the most Charlie Kaufman film I've seen. That works in some ways, but ultimately I felt like Kaufman's shortcoming is that his movies aren't really about anything. They're quirky and "interesting" but feel hollow in the end, leaving an unsatisfying sensation upon finishing the film.

 

There are some really nice scenes. The nightmare sequence in particular is quite well done, especially the moment when Michael loses his face, but that's surrounded by so much banal dross that I can't really see it as elevating.

 

If you'd asked me a decade ago if I wanted to see the multiple Malkovich scene from Being John Malkovich expanded out to an entire film, I'd probably have been excited about it. Now I'm just tired.

 

This is probably the weakest of the five films that got an Oscar nomination last year. I want to say that something else should have been nominated in its place, but really the field wasn't super strong, so even if I enjoyed Home a lot more, I couldn't really argue for its placement instead.

 

2/5