The works of Charlie Kaufman can never be confused with something conventional. Prior to "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" (2004), for which he wrote the screenplay, Kaufman's films were intellectual exercises, constantly engaging the viewer's mind but lacking any emotional impact. The characters in "Adaptation" (2002) and "Confessions of a Dangerous Mind" (2002) are cold and emotionally distant, leaving the viewer in a similar state. Even "Eternal Sunshine" gets its feeling more from Michel Gondry's direction than from Kaufman's words. "Synecdoche, New York," Kaufman's directorial debut, is the apotheosis of the trend to this point. It challenges the viewer in ways normally reserved for David Lynch, yet it is almost completely devoid of emotion.
"Synecdoche" stars Philip Seymour Hoffman as Caden Cotard, a playwright given a MacArthur Fellowship. Cotard decides to make a play about real life, but in an unexpected way. What follows is a nearly indecipherable plot, as Kaufman constructs realities within realities. Cotard may have his namesake syndrome, which would cause him to falsely believe that his body is slowly shutting down. Within this possible delusion, Cotard constructs his play, so deeply based in reality that he creates a character called Caden Cotard, played by Sammy (played by Tom Noonan). Sammy's Caden begins to take control of the play, and things only get wilder from there.
For the first time in his career, Kaufman has absolutely no interest in plot. The film has a clear destination, but it lacks a direction. It meanders for the majority of its running time, making the viewer feel the full extent of Cotard's life. This is where the film finds its greatest successes. We see Caden and Sammy compete for the love of Hazel (Samantha Morton), we watch as Caden tries to find his daughter, Olive, in Berlin and we bear witness to a man coming to terms with the ends of his mental ability and his physical decay. In several ways, the audience watches a man die.
Kaufman isn't the first man to use a deliberately non-linear structure to attempt to talk about "real life." His insistence on an abstract representation of neuroses and psychology simultaneously recalls Woody Allen and Lynch, two of the greatest examiners of the human mind still working in film. As opposed to attempts at presenting "real life" through a realistic style, represented in its most extreme by the "Dogme 95" films, "Synecdoche" attempts to reach beyond what people normally see.
The stylization engages with the viewer's mind in unusual ways, presenting moods more often than images. An early shot of Cotard entering the warehouse where he will stage his play minimizes him in comparison to the building. The symbolism works on multiple levels, each one showing Cotard's ineffectiveness in the face of his ambition, his future or simply the world around him. As in some of the best art, symbolism and abstraction say more about the "truth" or the world in which we live than simple presentation.
"Synecdoche" is not a film for everyone. It daringly challenges the viewer's concept of reality while piling on layers of truths and untruths. Its scope remains epic, though that is true for its ideas more than its technical qualities. It refuses to give the viewer the easy way out, and that is sure to frustrate most people who go in.
With the right set of expectations, however, the film blooms like few others. A careful eye will notice the repetitions of motifs, such as the use of the time 7:45. "Synecdoche" actively invites the viewer to watch it repeatedly and closely, and to judge it based on one viewing is naïve at best. Nevertheless, Kaufman's ambition manages to put forth a comprehensive view of what life is and can be. "Synecdoche" never satisfies the ever-present desire to understand what is going on, but it always manages to leave the viewer thinking.
