Can't believe I just wrote that obnoxious paragraph? Just wait! There's more! So much more. You simply cannot write about this film in normal terms, that's the annoying thing about it. Luckily, though, it's so complex that I've discovered you can basically say anything you want about it, as long as it's convoluted.

"It's life imitating art imitating life imitating art again..imitating life imitating art. Doubled. And then imitating life again. Then life twice more, then art three times, then a quick life/art, and then just death. And then art imitating death."

"The fear/longing of death actually orders and conducts the events of self-perception in an internal fantasy that examines one's own life in and then examines the examination and then gives up/achieves the realization of sweet, sweet death/end credits."

"Synecdoche, New York is like spinning around on the playground in order to make yourself dizzy, falling down on the ground and feeling the earth move in circles that lessen in intensity as time goes on and you reorient yourself to your surroundings. Only also you are on acid a little."

I seriously just made up these sentences on the fly, yet they make sense in this context.* Do you see what we are dealing with here?!

It's hard to review this movie using the same five star scale that I use for every film because part of me knows that this movie is leaps and bounds better than the other three star movies. I just can't get over the nagging suspicion that Synecdoche, New York could have been a complete package. Furthermore, I think that it really thought it was. Why? Because one of the major premises of the film is that small-town theater director Caden Cotard (Philip Seymour Hoffman, who is as talented and offputting as ever) is the newest incarnation of the everyman. He's me, he's you, he's Willy Loman, he's your next door neighbor, he's Barack Obama,** he's Mary Lou Retton, he's your first grade teacher, he's your ex-wife's cleaning lady, you get the drift.

But if that's the case, why do I feel so alienated? Caden's life...well, it's hard to explain. Time and reality shift and buckle. Remember the part in Adaptation when things start to shift into the high gear of moviemaking, and we start to realize that the film within the film is the film itself? Well, take how confusing that sentence I just wrote is and multiply it by a million. This is what you're in for. It's an endless cycle of repetition, like looking into a mirror while standing in front of another mirror, only it lacks any of that sort of symmetry and order. Not that that's inexcusable -- we're talking about the human psyche here. It can't be too simplified. There's something to be said for complications just for complications' sake -- to prove that the psyche isn't able to be pinned down and defined, but at least it should be able to be recognizable as such. Oh, I don't even know what I'm talking about anymore.

There has certainly never been a film like Synecdoche, New York. It covers new ground, which is something my heart fervently wants to applaud...but my head. My head!! How can I put my support behind something that I so desperately wanted to be over as soon as possible? Is there an excuse for that kind of filmmaking? So many people would say yes that I can't help but urge you to see this film. In my heart of hearts, I know it earns your nine dollars and most of the awards its about to win. However, my desire to watch another movie -- any movie -- at the end of the film would normally indicate a definite one star review. For that reason, I do not rate. And I can't talk about it anymore. I'm going to watch Pirates of the Caribbean now and revel in the simplicity of Disney. I don't even care.

*Rejected idea for this review: writing a review about myself writing a review about myself writing a review. What, shut up, I can be the Everyman too.
**In case you're not sure who he is, I've included a link for your convenience.

Ladies and gentlemen, Transsiberian finally made its way transamerica (whoa, another movie) to Richmond, VA amid accolades and fanfare and a Rotten Tomatoes rating of like 5000. And I could not be more excited about it!* Yes, this whimsical romp is about two American tourists, Jessie (Emily Mortimer) and Roy (Woody Harrelson),** merrily chugging their away across the cheerful wasteland of Siberia on the railroad that might be more aptly named the "TranSMILEberian Express." Director Brad Anderson is no stranger to lighthearted amusement -- you may have had the pleasure of catching his earlier film, The Machinist, which chronicles Christian Bale's quest to lose some excess poundage via the somewhat unconventional diet of pure guilt!

The folks in Transsiberian are no exception. Chasing the bliss that is their marriage, Jessie and Roy meet a delightful young couple, Abby (Kate Mara) and Carlos (Eduardo Noriega), and the four develop a strong relationship that is sure to deeply affect the rest of their lives... for the better! Though they don't know it, gruff police detective with a heart of gold, Grinko (Ben Kingsley) is about to catch up with them and kick off a classic comedy of errors during which no one ever tortures young girls. Things quickly escalate from good to great, and, as you sit in the theatre, you will feel your soul expanding with unadulterated joy as the film progresses.

You know those movies like You've Got Mail or She's All That? Movies about people who start off sad and a little bit lonely who finally find another person who appreciates them for who they are (and who they are is a really neat, creative person who are unlikely to traffic drugs or attempt rape). Transsiberia isn't like those movies at all! It's even more cheerful! It's so cheerful I had to literally sit on my hands to keep from waving them in the air like I just don't care! I even looked around the theatre at one of the most side-splitting parts, and all I could see was light reflected off grins and eyes filling up with appreciative tears. Not one person lurched towards the exit swearing never to travel anywhere ever again, and hardly anybody whispered to their neighbor "If this doesn't stop soon, I will find a way to commit suicide in this theatre."

Watch out, Wall-E! You're no longer the feel-good film of the year. Transsiberia is hot on your tail! Gosh, the way that Russian police disregard the law, endangering the inherent security that we feel because of our automatic trust in authority figures still makes me laugh out loud when I think of it! What a gas to be alone and friendless, surrounded by absolutely indifferent and borderline hostile faces. How romantic to be at the mercy of the below-zero-degree elements in just a thin sweater and no shoes! That airhead Jessie! Tossing her warm jacket and gloves just because of some little bloodstains! What will she do next!?!

You'll find out when you hop on board Transsiberia - the film that definitely will not cause you to slump your shoulders over with dread and dig your fingernails into your palms! Make sure you don't forget your one way ticket to fun!

*It's not that this movie wasn't well-made (although with a cheeseball ending and some really overt themes), but please, if you are sensitive like I am to movies like A Simple Plan and Very Bad Things, where everything goes from awful to difficult to watch, and stupid decisions inevitably lead their makers to their doom, skip this film.

**Terribly fine acting, for real. In fact, the directing was good too. And even much of the writing. I'm actually pretty sure that the bad taste that this movie left in my mouth has mostly to do with the fact that I am in general annoyed both by films that cause me to cringe for two hours and by films that have to keep repeating their themes to you so that you really and truly get them. It's almost like they're repeatedly smacking themes into your head with a club from a fence and leaving your corpse to be covered by the snow. That's actually not a bad description of how it felt to experience this solid slice of filmmaking -- head, club, corpse, snow.***

Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars

Joon-Ho Bong, 2006

4.5 out of 5 stars

I feel so effusive and enthusiastic about The Host that I’m worried I may come across as one of those Reading Rainbow book reviewers from when we were kids (“And what happens when you take your magical flying shoes to school? The best ending ever! But don’t take my word for it! Go check it out at your library!”). But really, I still feel swelled with amazement and feeling three days after seeing the movie, which, in case you’re unaware, is a Korean film that a lot of people are calling a monster movie but actually covers a lot more ground than that relatively layer-less genrefication* leads you to believe.

“The host” to which the title refers is a practically indescribable monster (Fish? Lizard? Snake? Monkey? Alien?), borne out of some irresponsible chemical dumping in the Han River in Korea. The monster (let’s call him “Jim,” for simplicity’s sake) swims and dives and charges like a champ, eating up Koreans along the way and spitting them out into his sewer nest. The authorities, such as they are, believe that “Jim,” in addition to being gross and scarily agile, is also carrying a virus. The unfortunate Park family has had the triple whammy of coming into contact with the beast (thereby becoming a biological threat), losing their youngest member to it, and, the worst of all frustrations, being unable to convince anybody that she’s still alive and needs their help.

There are at least two major things going on here. The first and most important is that even a dysfunctional family of misfits and screw-ups can band together (to the best of their ability, anyway) to break through a lockdown** and save one of their own. It’s not even something they have to think about, they automatically move as a unit towards their goal even while bickering amongst each other. Occasionally, this can be really funny, but it’s not consistent. The tragedy surrounding this group of vigilantes is too heavy to allow humor to exist for long, but somehow, it all works and The Host manages to be both funny and really, really upsetting. It’s a different sort of balance than monster films, which focus on the destruction of an unnatural being with weapons and one-liners. This film defies convention and dives much deeper into the psyches of those affected. Their struggles – physical and emotional – are detailed and engaging, and scenes unexpectedly explode in directions you never imagined.

The second theme is less prominent but eerily consistent throughout the film: the American government is nothing short of evil. Not just ridiculous or blundering or stupid as it’s often portrayed, the U.S. that’s represented here deliberately and consciously does the wrong things. Individual officials are reminiscent of The Matrix’s chilling Agent Smith – clear, calm, unsettling tones that contrast against the emotional Park family’s sputterings of grief and desperation. An American citizen heroically helps fight off the monster and is quickly and sadly eaten, but American government and military agents are directly responsible for the pollution of the river that causes the mutation, the hysteria caused by the announcement of the “virus,” and, most tellingly, the refusal to cease the deployment of their grand anti-biological warfare plan for the sake of the health of a few inconsequential Koreans. The idea – and I’m risking being blacklisted by the Patriot Act here - is that the American government jumps at (or invents) any opportunity to launch an excessive and misdirected campaign of fear, and…isn’t that terrorism?

Back to Jim for a second though. If you’re in this for a scare, The Host’s CGI won’t let you down. Nothing is more horrifying than a huge, disgusting, mutant alien-fish-lizard trying to devour adorable Korean children. There are a couple of artificial-looking spots, but for the most part, director Joon-ho Bong applies tension to special effects so well that even the pleasant Seoul riverside easily becomes an environment of fear and adrenaline. And the comedic parts turn into disturbing parts so quickly that we’re unable to adjust as fast as the film requires us to, causing the mood to become that much more jarring. It’s also beautiful, by the way, and, I don’t care what anyone says, you have to admire a director who can eke beauty out of chemical gas and regurgitated bones.

*This is a word, but Word, Firefox, and Webster.com don't believe me. You believe me, don't you?

**This may or may not be a word.

Joon-Ho Bong, 2006

4.5 out of 5 stars

I feel so effusive and enthusiastic about The Host that I’m worried I may come across as one of those Reading Rainbow book reviewers from when we were kids (“And what happens when you take your magical flying shoes to school? The best ending ever! But don’t take my word for it! Go check it out at your library!”). But really, I still feel swelled with amazement and feeling three days after seeing the movie, which, in case you’re unaware, is a Korean film that a lot of people are calling a monster movie but actually covers a lot more ground than that relatively layer-less genrefication* leads you to believe.

“The host” to which the title refers is a practically indescribable monster (Fish? Lizard? Snake? Monkey? Alien?), borne out of some irresponsible chemical dumping in the Han River in Korea. The monster (let’s call him “Jim,” for simplicity’s sake) swims and dives and charges like a champ, eating up Koreans along the way and spitting them out into his sewer nest. The authorities, such as they are, believe that “Jim,” in addition to being gross and scarily agile, is also carrying a virus. The unfortunate Park family has had the triple whammy of coming into contact with the beast (thereby becoming a biological threat), losing their youngest member to it, and, the worst of all frustrations, being unable to convince anybody that she’s still alive and needs their help.

There are at least two major things going on here. The first and most important is that even a dysfunctional family of misfits and screw-ups can band together (to the best of their ability, anyway) to break through a lockdown** and save one of their own. It’s not even something they have to think about, they automatically move as a unit towards their goal even while bickering amongst each other. Occasionally, this can be really funny, but it’s not consistent. The tragedy surrounding this group of vigilantes is too heavy to allow humor to exist for long, but somehow, it all works and The Host manages to be both funny and really, really upsetting. It’s a different sort of balance than monster films, which focus on the destruction of an unnatural being with weapons and one-liners. This film defies convention and dives much deeper into the psyches of those affected. Their struggles – physical and emotional – are detailed and engaging, and scenes unexpectedly explode in directions you never imagined.

The second theme is less prominent but eerily consistent throughout the film: the American government is nothing short of evil. Not just ridiculous or blundering or stupid as it’s often portrayed, the U.S. that’s represented here deliberately and consciously does the wrong things. Individual officials are reminiscent of The Matrix’s chilling Agent Smith – clear, calm, unsettling tones that contrast against the emotional Park family’s sputterings of grief and desperation. An American citizen heroically helps fight off the monster and is quickly and sadly eaten, but American government and military agents are directly responsible for the pollution of the river that causes the mutation, the hysteria caused by the announcement of the “virus,” and, most tellingly, the refusal to cease the deployment of their grand anti-biological warfare plan for the sake of the health of a few inconsequential Koreans. The idea – and I’m risking being blacklisted by the Patriot Act here - is that the American government jumps at (or invents) any opportunity to launch an excessive and misdirected campaign of fear, and…isn’t that terrorism?

Back to Jim for a second though. If you’re in this for a scare, The Host’s CGI won’t let you down. Nothing is more horrifying than a huge, disgusting, mutant alien-fish-lizard trying to devour adorable Korean children. There are a couple of artificial-looking spots, but for the most part, director Joon-ho Bong applies tension to special effects so well that even the pleasant Seoul riverside easily becomes an environment of fear and adrenaline. And the comedic parts turn into disturbing parts so quickly that we’re unable to adjust as fast as the film requires us to, causing the mood to become that much more jarring. It’s also beautiful, by the way, and, I don’t care what anyone says, you have to admire a director who can eke beauty out of chemical gas and regurgitated bones.

*This is a word, but Word, Firefox, and Webster.com don't believe me. You believe me, don't you?

**This may or may not be a word.

I feel stupid for giving any glowing reviews to any other movies this year because, in retrospect, they’re not worth the paper their tickets were printed on. “But surely…you still love The Squid and the Whale, right?” WRONG. And now I have to go back and reconsider all my Netflix ratings because Little Miss Sunshine has caused me to recalibrate my scale.

I will admit, however, that my enjoyment of this excellent film was heightened by the fact that the World Champion of the Best Fat Man Laugh finals was sitting directly in front of us, and I’m pretty sure that at least half of the laughs that came from the audience were because of this man, not the movie. He deserves his own review. He made my day.

That being said, this is still the best film I’ve seen all year. It’s funny while still managing to be fresh, and it’s fresh while still managing to be relevant. I get very tired of films about people who feel alienated and people who feel numb and blah-de-blah (see “Steve Martin Wrote Shopgirl, so Phil in Marketing Didn’t Have To"), and instead of embracing this hackneyed, hackneyed device, directors Dayton and Faris slap guys like Zach Braff in the face and tell them to quit whining and dance inappropriately around on a stage with your little sister.

Yes, the film is about failure and losers and might seem kind of depressing when you take that into consideration. But the main message is, even when you’ve done everything you can, sometimes things just don’t work out. Look straight at the coming disaster. The world isn’t against you. It’s just bad luck. And since there’s nothing you can do about it, you might as well drop all the lame bitterness and move on. F sulkers!

I don’t even want to go into any details, because they’re all so choice that I don’t want to spoil it for you. I laughed, I cried, I laughed at the guy laughing in front of me, I cried when he stopped laughing. I also laughed at the crying of others, but that’s just because I’m mean.

I wonder how many people in Hollywood go home at night, look in their bathroom mirrors, and cry into their sinks because they’ve shamelessly lied to Steve Martin’s face. Probably just as many as the publishing execs in New York who drooled all over his book deal. But…I guess that’s just the way it works. The entertainment industry exists to make money, and a name as respected as Martin’s is bound to garner a lot of cash for whatever it’s attached to.

Boring.

However, people, Shopgirl is as terrible a movie as it is a novella. While you’re watching it, you can just imagine the simpering ass-kissers with dollar-sign eyes edge closer to Steve.

“Mr. Martin, this book is a fantastic portrayal of today’s complex relationships.”

“The movie will really speak to young women struggling to discover their identity in a world where men are just so darn confusing!”

“Hey Steve! I had to look away so many times during the course of this movie in awkward disgust that I’m not sure I actually WATCHED the film so much as cringed into the back of my boyfriend’s couch for an hour and a half.”

Boringer.

Well, that last one was me, but you get the drift. Clearly nobody had the nerve to look the legendary comedian in the eye and bellow “STICK TO COMEDY, OLD MAN.” That would have been just what the doctor ordered. Somebody to break it to Martin that he’s about as deep and artsy as my high school theater director.*

My brain just died.

Not convinced? Still hanging onto that whole “this guy was The Jerk” thing? Let’s see if this one last list of inexcusable stuff about this movie convinces you to immediately remove it from your queue:

1. Slow motion at inappropriate times (as if there are ever appropriate times, unless that time is 1983).
2. Ridiculously heavy score.
3. “Romantic” scenes like the one in which rich silver fox Martin removes dowdy old Claire Danes’s wristwatch, encircles her wrist with his fingers and says “Now I’m your watch.” What?
4. Hopelessly outdated “Girls define themselves through their relationships” theme.
5. Painfully out of place narration by Martin himself, telling us things we already know, such as why Mirabelle (Danes) is so flingin flangin blue all the time!
6. And, an issue many movies run into, little to no shirtless Johnny Depp scenes.


You will find little to none of this scene.

*She always wore jumpers and named her baby Maximilian.

I wonder how many people in Hollywood go home at night, look in their bathroom mirrors, and cry into their sinks because they’ve shamelessly lied to Steve Martin’s face. Probably just as many as the publishing execs in New York who drooled all over his book deal. But…I guess that’s just the way it works. The entertainment industry exists to make money, and a name as respected as Martin’s is bound to garner a lot of cash for whatever it’s attached to.

Boring.

However, people, Shopgirl is as terrible a movie as it is a novella. While you’re watching it, you can just imagine the simpering ass-kissers with dollar-sign eyes edge closer to Steve.

“Mr. Martin, this book is a fantastic portrayal of today’s complex relationships.”

“The movie will really speak to young women struggling to discover their identity in a world where men are just so darn confusing!”

“Hey Steve! I had to look away so many times during the course of this movie in awkward disgust that I’m not sure I actually WATCHED the film so much as cringed into the back of my boyfriend’s couch for an hour and a half.”

Boringer.

Well, that last one was me, but you get the drift. Clearly nobody had the nerve to look the legendary comedian in the eye and bellow “STICK TO COMEDY, OLD MAN.” That would have been just what the doctor ordered. Somebody to break it to Martin that he’s about as deep and artsy as my high school theater director.*

My brain just died.

Not convinced? Still hanging onto that whole “this guy was The Jerk” thing? Let’s see if this one last list of inexcusable stuff about this movie convinces you to immediately remove it from your queue:

1. Slow motion at inappropriate times (as if there are ever appropriate times, unless that time is 1983).
2. Ridiculously heavy score.
3. “Romantic” scenes like the one in which rich silver fox Martin removes dowdy old Claire Danes’s wristwatch, encircles her wrist with his fingers and says “Now I’m your watch.” What?
4. Hopelessly outdated “Girls define themselves through their relationships” theme.
5. Painfully out of place narration by Martin himself, telling us things we already know, such as why Mirabelle (Danes) is so flingin flangin blue all the time!
6. And, an issue many movies run into, little to no shirtless Johnny Depp scenes.


You will find little to none of this scene.

*She always wore jumpers and named her baby Maximilian.

Soderbergh, 2005

My poor friend Thara spent one Saturday in March waiting patiently for me to make the most elaborate cake ever. Not only did she wash a lot of dishes for me, she also helped me with the arduous task of making parchment collars, which is a lot harder than it sounds. If it sounds like anything. And what did I do in return? I decided, while waiting for some chocolate mousse to chill, that we were going to sit right down and watch Bubble.

Let me just get this out of the way: I love Steven Soderbergh. I think that about 90% of the time* he nails it and does the best possible job of the job he’s trying to do. Ocean’s Eleven? Great heist remake. Out of Sight? Clever and engaging flick. Solaris? A great mood of a movie. I feel like ol’ Steve is a guy who has a goal and accomplishes that goal to the letter, with enough shirtless Clooney footage to make my knees sweat.

Let me also say something else: We’re in the middle of a fad change (says I.) The whole “late-twenties disassociated protagonist meets some quirky individual and we all learn to feel again to the tune of a vaguely hip soundtrack” motif is over, pretty much. Lost in Translation marked the climax of that movement and Garden State’s mainstream popularity marked the beginning of the descent into triteness. And by the time Hollywood starts getting the picture and churning out mildly good duplicates, you know a new trend is already in full swing in the independent world.

The Country Livin’ thing, as I’m going to call it from now on, logically follows the Disassociated Protagonist thing. Think about it. In the latter, we’re encouraged to snap out of our ennui and be comfortable in our own skins. Got it. In the former, we’re going one step further and rejecting our constructed urban drama in favor of the simple life. Films like Junebug feature a character to whom we can relate and juxtaposes her/us in an unfamiliar Carolina Cheerwine-swigging** world. With this, we can feel her guilt for putting her own troubles above those of her countrified in-laws, but we also breathe a little easier seeing the direct contrast between them, identifying with her discomfort and alienation, and allowing ourselves a certain amount of relief that our lives are a little more comfortable and a little more, shall we say, enlightened.

Bubble cuts to the chase. Get rid of the urban, artsy character thrown in for our identification and what are you left with? A film that nobody will really like.

In other words, Bubble drills down to the level of Country Livin’ Normalcy. The characters seem awkward because real-life people are awkward. The plot seems slow because real-life plots are slow. There’s no twist and no suspense. Martha’s motivation to murder a young, single mother isn't surprising; she shows interest in Martha’s only friend! In the bubble (GET IT?) of Martha’s extremely small life, her one joy is about to be taken away from her, and she reacts in kind.

We all have similar bubbles, and if our daily drama was on display for the world, you can bet it would get equally as scornful Netflix Member Reviews. Nobody cares about this sort of minutia, unless it directly involves them. There’s a reason it’s called a “bubble” in the first place – someone’s inside and someone’s outside. And without that urban hip character condescending to slum amongst the poor folk, we don’t have anything in this picture relating to us. And conversely, if you can identify with Bubble’s Appalachian Ohio setting, as does my friend Thara, who grew up in West Virginia (damn, that is a good picture), you’re bored and irritated and a little uncomfortable, and that’s understandable. They don’t link the word “escapism” to moviegoing for nothing. You watch films to forget about your own bubbles for an hour and a half, not to be reminded of them.

As far as the grand marketing experiment of releasing a film in theaters and on DVD simultaneously***, I’m not exactly sure what they were trying to prove. That they’re not in it for the money? Well, when you’re Steven Soderbergh, you don’t have to be. You can afford to make these sorts of gestures with a film that is its own experiment in filmmaking and what’s more, must be generally unlikeable in order to prove its point.

Although it’s certainly possible that they just wanted to get those DVD extras out there ASAP, just to shed some light on the subject and defend their reputations to the inevitable naysayers who think that they just slipped up and made a bad film. The extra features also entertain your household pets:

*Anyone who has anything to do with Waking Life automatically gets docked a few percentage points.
**Cheerwine is the most delicious beverage ever. Oh my God, I think about it on an hourly basis and kick the Coke machine in my office whenever I walk by.
***"When the 'bubble' bursts"? Psshh.

Look, it’s Big!!

Wait, no, it’s the opposite of that. That joke didn’t work as well as I wanted. Anyway, my brother’s been on my case to watch Birth for a long time, but seeing as how we don't always agree*, it took me awhile to get around to it.

I’ve been trying to put these reviews together for both Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and Closer (Judefest 2005). The first one was giving me trouble because I just kept typing “No! No! No! No!” over and over, and Closer I liked, but couldn’t think of anything to write about besides “I will never trust anybody. Love isn’t real. Jude’s not so hot all the time. No! No! No! No!” So you can see my dilemma. No wonder I haven’t heard yay or nay from grad school yet; they’re probably hanging out in their offices laughing it up.** LAUGH IT UP, GRAD SCHOOL, BECAUSE HERE COMES BIRTH!

Birth has a strange feel to it, like it should be a fancy 80s movie starring Dudley Moore and, well, Nicole Kidman. The lighting is low, and, and most of the action takes place in a very, VERY posh and classically decorated Manhattan apartment. The music is distinctive and light-hearted, causing even more confusion, since we’re dealing with a heavy and possibly ridiculous subject. It all works.

OK, the premise behind this movie is that a 10-year-old boy, Sean (Cameron Bright,), shows up in Anna’s (Nicole Kidman) life, claiming to be the reincarnation of her dead husband, also named Sean. Anna is thrown by this, since she is newly engaged to this guy Joseph (Danny Huston). Other items to keep in mind: Anna AND Joseph live in a giant Manhattan apartment with Anna’s mother (Lauren Bacall), her sister, her brother-in-law, the token black housekeeper, and a crapload of posh stuff.

Little Sean can spout out enough facts about Anna to convince her that maybe Dead Sean is really and truly staring at her through his little eyes, and soon we begin to accept this as fact.

The questions begin to surface:
1. Isn’t it sort of awful to think about this 30-something woman actually considering starting an intimate (GROSS) relationship with a 10-year-old boy?
2. When is Joseph going to flip his lid, finally?
3. How can this possibly work out well for anyone?
4. Wait, why are they all living in an apartment with their MOTHER?

Birth ends up working out in a weird way, and I’m about to spoil it for you. Clara (Anne Heche), who reveals that she was Adult Sean’s lover – she actually says that, I didn’t use the word “lover” voluntarily – busts Tiny Sean by figuring out that he’d read a bunch of lette--- you know what? It’s too long to go into and too confusing if you haven’t seen it. I’ll sum up: “Director Jonathan Glazer is a nancy.”

The film begins with a death and a birth, which we are meant to believe happen simultaneously, as Adult Sean jogs into a tunnel and Young Sean is squeezed out of one. At this moment, director Jonathan Glazer indicates the “truth” through shot juxtaposition: Young Sean equals Adult Sean reincarnated. No matter how much the rest of the film tries to question this fact, you have this major, defining clue on which to fall back. The problem is, you spend the whole movie trying to justify the love between a woman in her thirties and a boy in short pants. You try and try to make it seem OK to yourself, half of you identifying with Anna and half of you identifying with her skeptical family. You start thinking, "What if this happened to me?" and some of you probably make a note to go check out some books about reincarnation, just to explore this idea further. You work yourself up to feeling sorry for the kids' parents, summarily swept aside in favor of his newfound "manhood," and you practically almost go online and buy some Amtrak tickets to a remote Western town just so Anna and Sean can have some goddamn privacy.

This is the best part in the whole film. One
very long close-up shot where you can see someone
completely unravel. Don't listen to the rest of this review,
seriously. I liked this movie a lot.

Woops! You're an idiot. Turns out Sean is faking the whole thing. The film wants to give the little guy the benefit of the doubt and allows Sean to explain that he actually in a way believed that he truly was a reincarnation, but in truth, it just scares itself out of pushing any envelopes. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's a little relieving, actually. This way we don't have to compromise any of our natural revulsion towards child molestation, and we can walk away from Birth guilt-free, but it's a huge letdown. We'd almost gotten ourselves to the point of completely questioning everything we believe in, and it was about to be pretty liberating.

And I'm positive that Jonathan Glazer actually meant for Sean to be what he claims he is. After all, he not only gives us the death/birth imagery in the first few minutes, he crafts Sean's character into the only person in this sea of dangerously oblivious and neurotic Manhattanites who has any sort of conviction. Sean tends to either soothe or enrage Anna's family with his utter tranquility about the whole thing. At the end of the film, Anna marries Joseph and we're privvy to a little meltdown she experiences at their wedding, but at this point, we don't blame her. Sheesh, we just had one ourselves. On our couches. To our cats. It's pretty exasperating to let go of a lot of well-justified cynicism and let in the hope that true love conquers all, just to have it dashed to pieces. My cat, of course, slapped me in the face and told me stop being a sissy. It's a good movie anyway, and getting close to pushing a boundary is better than not knowing there's a boundary in the first place.

*Oh my God, I just realized that the tagline for Crash is "You think you know who you are. You have no idea." Was your world just rocked?
**Since this was written, I've actually begun both grad school and a long-distance relationship, and I'd like to use those as excuses, both for blogging and for being generally absent in all of yo' lives.