Charlie Kaufman

Writer-director Charlie Kaufman offers a few thoughts re the current state of movie-making: "I think it's a disaster out there," says Kaufman, who established his own style of story in such films as Adaptation, Being John Malkovich and his directing debut, last year's Synecdoche, New York. "I don't think the mid-range movie is going to exist anymore," he says in a phone interview from his California home. "Movies are going to be blockbusters or really, really tiny budgets. And the tiny-budget movies have a very, very hard time getting distributed. ``All the places that distribute those movies have closed down. . . . There ... Read Full Story

“Synecdoche” (pronounced, sin-EK-doh-kee) is a literary term that means using a part of something to represent the whole or vice-versa. For instance a hand could also mean a worker, or the law could also refer to a police officer. If you use this word in context with Shakespeare’s quote, “All the world is a stage…” and the generic figure of speech, “Life imitating art and vice-versa,” then you get a vague idea of what the film “Synecdoche, NY” is trying to accomplish. Oscar-winning screenwriter, Charlie Kaufman, assembles some of tinseltown’s most prestigious screen actors for his ambitious directorial debut. The brave supporting cast reads ... Read Full Story

Synecdoche, New York Starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener, and Michelle Williams Directed by Charlie Kaufman Rated R The problem with Synecdoche, New York is that it has very little direct about it or direction within it. The irony is that it's a film about a director. Many of us have long admired Charlie Kaufman 's writing; his scripts for Being John Malkovich , Adaptation. , and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind are among the best and most original in the past quarter century or more. All three have been given Academy Award nominations, and Eternal Sunshine won the Best Original Screenplay Oscar ... Read Full Story

So we've had Shane Black's shoe box , David Lynch's sugar rushes , and Paul Schrader's charts . All interesting approaches to writing a script. But perhaps none as personal and iconoclastic as Charlie Kaufman . Here are excerpts from three interviews available online. The first is from Indie Wire in 1999 regarding the release of the movie Being John Malkovich : Q: How much research do you do, for example into characters, before jumping into the actual script? Kaufman: I think about things for a long time. I think about things a lot. I write notes to myself, I take long walks and ... Read Full Story

Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener, Samantha Morton, Michelle Williams, Emily Watson Director: Charlie Kaufman Release Date: October 24, 2008 Running Time: 124 mins MPAA Rating: R Distributors: Sony Picture Classics - - - On a personal level, I consider Charlie Kaufman the most talented working screenwriter in Hollywood. I don’t think I am alone in this thought. His resume is one of impressive and envious of anyone in the past however many years you want to use to quantify it. It is one thing to craft a story with intelligent structure and dialogue. It is another thing altogether to create entire universes that ... Read Full Story