![]() ![]() Jake is almost an afterthought, though he's an ever present one whose presence is essential.īeing honest, I'm not sure I'd have ever believed Plemons to have this type of performance in him. Every costume.īuckley undefined provides much of the definition for everything that unfolds in the film, though definition has never really been one of Kaufman's stronger qualities. While there are filmmakers who claim as much, Kaufman truly lives into it in extraordinary ways. ![]() The Brit is masterful here, though perhaps that's a tad unfair given that we're not exactly privy to much knowledge about this young woman at all who is, at times, known by Lucy and Amy and other names that may or may not be accurate.īuckley's inner dialogue with herself is far more engaging than any words exchanged with her boyfriend, whom we do know as Jake, though if you're listening carefully, and this is a Kaufman film so you should be, you'll realize that far more is going on here than a simple inner dialogue. They've only been together several weeks we're told, over and over again, and it appears this relationship has an end in the not so distant future.ĭe Niro is nowhere to be found here, yet it's practically undeniable that there does always seem to be this third character waiting in the wings, personified at various times by the back-and-forth swishing of windshield wipers or the steadily falling snow or the slight whispers of the wind or, even more so, the inner dialogue that is so pervasive one swears it must be audible.īuckley is rapidly proving herself to be one of contemporary cinema's greatest actresses, an actress of tremendous range and an actress able to adopt nearly accent in a way unrivaled only by the great Meryl Streep. The young couple is played by Jessie Buckley and Jesse Plemons, a laughably absurd common ground that would feel like a narrative/casting gimmick if it all didn't play out so incredibly sublimely. We meet a young woman, her name is never fully established, as she prepares to enter a car with a young man she hesitantly calls her boyfriend as they venture out into a snowy Oklahoma night for a trip home to visit the young man's parents.Įverything feels normal, at least momentarily. The novel plopped itself down squarely into the world of psychological horror, though Kaufman's spin is decidedly more ambiguous and less willing to plant itself inside any single genre. It is as much a cinematic cousin to Meet the Parents as it is Kaufman's own Synecdoche, New York with a straightforward premise that takes labyrinthian turns and inversions that actually matter.īased on a 2016 novel by Iain Reid by the same name, i'm thinking of ending things exists very much in Kaufman's voice. It works in every possible way, nearly flawless while setting itself in a world that is far from flawless. It's difficult to describe i'm thinking of ending things without spoiling the surprise of actually watching it, though it's a weird one even by Kaufman's lofty standards yet it's also, perhaps, his most emotionally honest and resonant film to date. ![]() ![]() There's a little "i" deep inside the existential heart of Charlie Kaufman's latest, and I'd dare say greatest, motion picture i'm thinking of ending things, easily the best of a trio of movies fueling Hollywood's cinematic tiptoe toward cinematic normal life in a COVID-19 world. ![]()
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