Anomalisa
2015
****½
Director: Charlie Kaufman, Duke Johnson
Cast: David Thewlis, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tom Noonan
Michael Stone is a renowned customer service guru who seems to have lost all joy in his life. He has grown distant from his wife and son, and every man and woman around him appears to look and sound the same, except for Lisa, one of the guests in his hotel in Cincinnati. This captivating stop motion animation was written and co-directed by Charlie Kaufman. Like his previous work in Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, it deals with memories and identity. Do the hours that Michael and Lisa spend together symbolise a failed romantic relationship in microcosm? Is Michael having a mental breakdown or is some or all of it his hallucinatory dream? Kaufman and Johnson's funny and unsettling film doesn't offer easy answers.
