Literary equivalent of Charlie Kaufman?

That's just called being jewish

I have always unironically liked non-linear films. I don't like Synecdoche because it's a hopelessly trite story about the most boring things imaginable packaged in inane artifices.

i would say Murakami

>hopelessly trite story about the most boring things imaginable
and what would these things be? it's been a while since i've seen the film.

>fuck
>no fuck
>sad
>die

Plot of the eon!

He borrows a lot from Tennessee Williams.

>human condition is le trite masturbatory bullshit
oh just fuck off fraud.

how are fucking and dying the most boring things imaginable? it's okay to dislike Kaufman's writing and films, but it seems to me you're fishing for reasons here. i mean, what would literature or film be without the exploration of fucking and dying?

I wish I had someone I could talk to about Synedoche. There's so much to discuss about that movie but no one ever seems willing to talk about it. The only good discussion I had with someone about the movie was from Veeky Forums a long while back who said that the movie was postmodern and shouldn't be taken seriously, that it was actually hilarious and every part is meant to be making you in an absurdist way.

I think people misunderstand Kaufman and try too hard to put the artist into the art. Like in Adaptation where Nicolas Cage #1 is endlessly anxious about writing a screenplay and people say that Charlie is exactly like him because they both have the same name and job in a meta sense.

I personally felt like Anomolisa was just a smaller version of Synedoche with its concept of love, feeling alone and getting bored of everyone around you.

>meant to be making you in an absurdist way.
meant to be making you laugh*
Admittedly, there are a lot of hilarious moments
>hey Caden I think Hazel should act this way
>huh? No! The real Hazel, *me*, hasn't done that and wouldn't act that way!
>uh, yes Hazel actress, you know more about Hazel than Hazel herself, so let's do that
The movie has a bunch of funny meta parts like that.

A film simply mentioning the human condition does not make it good.

Look up YourMovieSucksDotOrg or whatever his youtube channel is. Memes galore.

>getting bored of everyone around you.

Case and point. Something only a deluded narcissist does.

I've already watched his video analysis. They're not bad but there's a lot more to examine. I've read most analyses online, his videos and other videos on the topic but nothing really goes deep into the movie's themes.
I want someone to talk to about this movie, someone to communicate to. Not some goddamn voice of what they thought of the movie. Dialogue, communication, argument, new interpretation through arguments!
Surely there's someone here on Veeky Forums who loves that movie enough to talk to me about it? I've tried so many times on /tv/ but they're full of idiots. And those that sometimes say that they love the movie don't even want to talk about it.

It's so lonely.

>there's a lot MORE to examine

W-what else could there be? "Analysis" quickly degenerates into fractally splitting hairs ad infinitum. Don't go down that path, man.

People only have about 6-7 life stories, a couple dozen to a hundred trivia knowledge info, a vague personal philosophy that they can't really explain, a hidden hypocrisy with their true self, and depending on the person, a funny personality which gets old over time.

People are disappointing the more you know them.

Listen to the lyrics in the song for caden
youtube.com/watch?v=662uPQ7Xrdw

>No one will ever love you
>For everything you are

>And so you build up layers of deception
>And you leave out things to alter the perceptions
>Of the ones you love
>Who would never love you back
>If they knew all about you
>Every solitary fact

>And the sadness of your life
>Is built upon this lie
>Of really knowing anyone
>Or having them know you

>It's the sadness of the world
>There's nothing left to do

If someone knew you, TRULY knew you, with all your faults, your base desires, ignorance, repetitive quirkiness, annoyance and blind ignorance and hypocrisy, would you still be with them?
Would you still be with someone who you find boring? Someone who has nothing to teach you? Someone you cannot get any amount of happiness?

Why would you ever be with someone who's boring and has nothing to teach you about life?

Friendship is simply a race to see who can bore the other person first. And the more time you spend with someone, the faster this process accelerates. Simply saying it's narcissistic doesn't mean that dread isn't true. I feel it. I know it, I love and hate people. People are boring. I'm boring. No man is an island and there are only so much room a person can have before you've seen all there is to see on the island.

There is more! There's so much more. Everything about human civilization, dread, sadness, love, acceptance, refusal, rejection, causality, romance, sex, death, ignorance, apathy, empathy, art, artist, people, nobodies, innocence.
EVERYTHING EVERYTHING EVERYTHING.

I just want someone to talk to about this movie. Why isn't there anyone? Why do I have to suffer alone rewatching this movie, not knowing if I've missed something I could've never known or imagined. A theme, a message, a view. Something! Anything! I'm not God, how can I know all the themes about everything in this movie?

I need someone else. But there's no one. I'm alone.

youtube.com/watch?v=fLeFIxvOm3s

RIP this guy.

Thinking everyone is boring is a phase during which you don't understand what's important and what isn't and some people grow out of, some don't. I skipped the part about...um...song lyrics? Come on. Get over yourself.

What fucking movie?

Synecdoche New York.

>tfw people take the eulogy in Synecdoche seriously when it's actually taking the piss out of Caden's juvenile worldview and his overreaching attempts at profundity, as well as making fun of big, melodramatic speeches toward the end of movies that put everything in perspective

>not realizing Kaufmann is criticizing the main characters in his movies

K, haven't seen the movie but sounds like you need to get out more. The problem is larger than not having someone to discuss this movie with, the problem is you have no one to express yourself to.

Oh OP you're looking for Italo Calvino.

>thinking Kaufman, and by extension they, don't sympathize with the narcissists in his movies.

>implying that recognizing your own flaws in characters is a bad thing, and that an author can't use his own flaws as inspiration for art

it appears you lack either the critical thinking or composition skills to adequately or concisely state what your issues with the film are without resorting to, ahem, trite generalizations. as i mentioned, it's okay to dislike Kaufman's work, no problem with that, but the reasons you stated are inane as nearly every great work of art and literature explores the very themes you reject as boring. also, your succinct responses are probably telling about the type of mind we're dealing with here.

>implying patting yourself on the back is virtuous

Ignorance, insolence, apathy. Nothing matters, but people are important so long as they remain interesting. We exist for such a short period of time on this earth but we want to be loved, we want to be understand others but only out of a vague self interest and curiosity. The only thing that matters is what we give meaning to and spend time with, until it stops boring us.
But I guess that's a part of live too.

No one is boring. Everyone has a story, a past, a history, knowledge, experience, a personality, a worldview. But these do no last forever. Love doesn't last forever.

You don't understand, you don't care. That's fine. It's always fine. I just wish someone understood.

Everyone I express myself to hates me. I'm too honest, too deliberately forward. It has to be that way. When you tell people that you don't care about them, when you tell people that you enjoy being with them because they're entertaining and nothing more, people grow distant. The only thing I can do is try my best. Try try and try to never be boring. Stop being repetitive like everyone. Stop saying the same jokes, know more, do more, experience more, see more, read and watch more. The only way to be liked by people is to experience life more than them before they get bored of you.
I've seen it done to me, I've done it to people. It's the truth, it's how people act.
In an attempt to be loved, we show only our most enjoyable traits, trying to leave out our worst and through time and interaction, people know your worst traits.
But it's not enough, you can't show your true face. You can't be honest about everything and blunt. There is no answer, there's nothing to do. A friend of mine a few weeks ago was diagnosed with terminal stages of cancer and told me about it. He wanted me to tell him that I would cry about him when he would die. That I would care when he will be gone. But I couldn't. I just told him that the truth. I wouldn't care. I would cry but I wouldn't care. Everyone dies. Why would it matter if I cried? Why would it matter to him when he's dead? When you're dead, there's nothing left. You're no longer around to see how the world goes on without you.
You can't be blunt, you can't show your true self. Lies lies lies, you can only forward a mask until people get bored of you. You have to be a Don Juan of life, going from friendship to friendship, love to love, only enjoying the best before it crashes as it all does.
Sadness is the end conclusion to all.

Why does no one see it? It's as if this movie is the only thing that see it. And no one wants to talk about it. I just don't understand.

It's not the themes that are boring, it's Kaufman's exploration of these themes. Godzilla films contain giant monsters, that doesn't make them scary or even entertaining.

>implying that acknowledging your flaws is somehow self-congratulatory

i hate you guys

Synecdoche, New York is my favorite movie but you missed its point entirely. You're not supposed to take the view of the world it presents as a reflection of reality, but rather as the specific perspective of a dysfunctional, insecure manchild. If you see yourself in its philosophy you should work to better yourself rather than accept that philosophy as an accurate description of reality.

Arghggh, another person who doesn't understand. The speech was not made by Caden but by someone who understood Caden but also did not.
Caden copied life, replicated it. Art imitating reality and letting the viewer find the meaning of life and of the art when there is none, even when Caden wants a meaning to be heart.
When that woman makes the priest say the speech and message Caden wants to say, it's preachy but it's everything Caden wants. It's the message he wants to say but lacks the fortitude to do. But it feels preachy, it feels wrong. And that's the message about art. You cannot convey your message deliberately.
A story is engaging, but being talked down to is condescending. The duality of both is needed. Art is an imitation of life, but without a message it is worthless.
Caden never understood that, he can only look at himself and his final work is a self masturbatory work of reliving his greatest day; the day when his wife will die. There is no message, there is nothing to be learn of his art.

Do you understand? Do you see?
Duality is how life should be lived. With masks and the truth. Imitation and messages. Art and reality. Life and death.

It's so lonely. Why doesn't anyone understand?

i see. one thing before i go. boring is not a quality inherent to any work of art. it is you who find it so. the day you learn the difference and apply it to your criticism of art is the day your opinion will cease to be juvenile.

you're really self focused dude. no hate, im that way sometimes too. but if you want an insight on how to get out of the dark shit you feel stuck in is that sometimes the way out isnt about finding/having someone help you feel better, its doing something for someone else and getting out of your own head enough to be able to give that thing that you desire to someone else. thats convoluted sure, but you kinda get it right? a way to experience that thing is to create it for someone else out of selflessness

How can it be the perspective of a manchild when the sadness transcends his character and affects everyone else? The sadness of Caden is isolated to himself and his own securities. The sadness of being alone, misunderstood is shared by Caden's wife, by Hazel, Olive.You conflate the unhappiness of Caden as the simulacrum of reality when it is the opposite. Reality is the exact reflection of this movie and everyone in it, not just Caden.

Caden isn't truthful. He can't express himself. He's overflown with guilt, he's unable to connect with people. I get along great with people, I simply run away from them, or them from me. It's all a game, a chance, a timer until one leaves the other. All relationships are like that.

>implying I'm just like you

I get it, but there is no escape. People are boring. I'm boring. No man is an island. All you can do is add more sand in the hopes that it attracts someone more interesting. All love, all relationships, all knowledge, all social connections are formed on this basis. No one would ever talk to someone who repeats themselves, has nothing to say or is boring. When you have everything, done everything, seen everyone, and people just all mesh together, what's left? Who's left? Love, sex, relationship, knowledge, books, trivia knowledge. It all meshes together. Life is boring and it's not.
There is nothing in the world but selfish desires. And I hate it. I fucking hate it. There's nothing that can make anyone selflessness.

I just wish the world wasn't the way it is.
I just want someone to agree with me. Someone to talk about this movie. Someone who sees what I see and understand. But no one does. No one cares, because they have their own misery.

What's-his-name from Stuart Little and House wrote something. Hugh Laurie.

I pretty much agree with you about the eulogy but I don't think your point contradicts mine. Yes, the eulogy is exactly what Caden feels, but the corny music, fake rain, and absurdity of the character delivering it (a priest saying fuck) point out the banality and triteness of the speech. Caden thinks its message is profound, and the sentiment truly is relatable, but ultimately its little more than platitude. The message of the scene is that all of Caden's efforts to imbue life with meaning amount only to shallow artifice and can never reach the essence of life. Basically I think the movie is about the futility of the search for meaning and how it ruins anyone who cannot satisfy themselves without a final answer.

>implying I didn't mean "your" in the general sense

The other characters attained some degree of happiness because they lived life and pursued happiness in some way. Other characters die happy. Caden questions things until the very last moment. His wallowing in endless questions deprives him of the actual experience of living.

The message is profound. Every action can lead us to our own misery and we'll never know what single point in our life created this. You might know, hell you might even reflect on the singular moment in time, but you couldn't have seen where it lead you.
It's the way it's conveyed that distorts the reality of the message. The priest isn't realistic or acts like a priest. The air isn't real, the rain is fake, the people crying are crying crocodile tears but it lacks impact because it is outside of reality. It's simply condescending. Art imitating life without a message is worthless, but a message without anything grounding it in reality to convey is worthless and ignored or taken seriously.

I have found the meaning of life, of people, of the universe, of civilization, everything! It's not the search but the way we convey ourselves to people. How we communicate and are unable to do so. Your need and desire to be with people but being unable to connect at all with others. Our absolutely loneliness. Books for example are the most direct means of communicating from one soul to another and look at Finnegans Wake. Arguably the one true novel like Synecdoche New York that discusses and delves into every theme and people can't even understand it. Or other people who misunderstand works or their theme. We search for meaning because we want to be accepted and loved when we can't love anyone else but ourselves and some can't even love who they are or what lead them where they are.

I feel like the only sane person who has seen the truth atop of the world, unable to explain anything to anyone with no one understanding how futile and hateful people are to each other, with complete ignorance and sadness.

Hazel died waiting to be loved.
Caden had nothing.
Adel died of lung cancer because of her ignorance of her condition.
Olive died hating her father.
There psychologist's work was worthless and so was her life.
Everything anything ever struggled was worthless and everyone ended in misery and suffering.
Hell, the whole fucking world died! Nothing left, nothing remaining, no one caring, everyone gone. Because nothing mattered.

Duality.

>I think people misunderstand Kaufman and try too hard to put the artist into the art

For me the film felt intensely personal, like Kaufman had put all of himself in it. I just don't see how it could be any other way - but I may be completely wrong about that and, if so, fair play to the artist.

I find it a worthless endeavor to try and find the artist in the art. While it does give more soul to the art, the end result tends to be people looking deeply into the life of the artist to try and get a better understanding of the art itself. And, more often than not, you only get the intent of what was conveyed into the art, not what the art has to say about reality and life.

I mean, with Synecdoche, Being John Malkovich ,Anomalisa and Adaptation, you see nervous wrecks as protagonist who either have life somewhat under control yet don't really. What personally clued me that Kaufman possible has nothing to do with his art is in an interview when some tried to get him to talk about how similar Charlie Kaufman in Adaptation was the same as himself. And rather than allude to them being similar, he just talked about how pathetic that character was and the ironies it held, as though it was nothing more than a character, nothing personal at all.
I mean, of coouuuurrrseee Synecdoche is personal, Caden got the Mcarthur grant for being a genius and Kaufman is a genius! They're the same!!!!

His movies hit personally deep and from the heart but I don't see the artist self inserting himself (not like in Adaptation where Charlie Kaufman literally self inserted himself in the script within the script where the character Charlie Kaufman also self inserted himself).

The only real theme that gets repeated is that actors are puppets that are controlled. You see that in Being Malkovich with a puppeteer controlling Malkovich, and in Synecdoche where no one moves, as though they're puppets for a show. And the logical conclusion with Anomalisa where the characters are literal stop motion puppets. That itself is personal.

I really don't understand why people in general try to know more about the artist to get a better understanding of art. You see this in almost every medium worth a damn and it's weird.

good posts

long*

not necessarily good.
There was this black girl in my high school who everyone thought was the best student ever and she filled like 6 pages of notebook paper each time we had a test and I outscored her every fucking time.

good post

haha yeah that actually makes sense ;-)

good post

there are a lot of other long posts in this thread, mind. i only picked the ones i enjoyed friendo. calm down

I'm shocked nobody has mentioned it yet, but the obvious literary equivalent to Synecdoche, New York is Tom McCarthy's Remainder. It has an extremely similar premise and was written just before the movie came out, but (according to Kaufman) he never read it. It's also very good in its own right.

John Barth's Lost in the Funhouse

Hey, I recognize this image. Haven't been on this board for a while, but I remember talking to you a month or two ago about something. Not exactly sure what though, might have been an anime. You definitely said something about finding people boring, or feeling that they have nothing to offer you. Do you remember that conversation/what it was originally about? Now that I've been reminded of it, it's going to bother me until I remember it fully.

In exchange, I'll discuss SNY with you; it's been a while since I saw it, but if you mention specific scenes I'm sure I'll be able to comment on them.

Me () again. Ironically enough, for all your obsession with the film, you seem to have turned it off before the end. Go watch the final scene again.

If you honestly and truly believe everything you say, and you aren't just trying to be edgy, you might be a sociopath. Love isn't a product of entertainment value, it comes from shared experience, from the knowledge that your fellow man suffers along with you, experiences the same boredom and emptiness as you, but still has the capacity for hope and imagination and caring. Your observations are very true of many people, but not everyone is like that, and no one has to be.

>what was once an exciting mysterious future is now behind you, lived, understood, disappointing
>you realize you're not special, you struggled into existence and are now silently slipping out of it
>this is everyone's experience, every single one, the specifics hardly matter, everyone is everyone
>all everyone meager sadness are also your, all their sadness, it is time for you to understand this
>as the people who adore you stop adoring you, as they die, as they move on, as you shed them, your beauty, your youth, as the world forgets you, as you lose your characteristics one by one, you think only about driving, just driving, counting off time
>now you're here, now you're there.
>now you're... gone.

The ending is how we're all alone, we live alone, we pretend we want other people to look out for us, and even if some do, they leave. Everyone leaves. Everyone dies. Nothing remains, nothing remains constant. Everything just dies.

You are both correct and incorrect. Love is a product of selfish entertainment value of wanting to be loved, in which, in turn, you love someone else who also desires to be loved.

Love is an illusion, a misunderstanding.
Mutual love is a mutual misunderstanding of being mutually loved.
And engagement is a vow to not wake up for your whole life from that misunderstanding.

You see it in Caden, desperately searching for the love of his wife who left him years ago.
You see in with Hazel, who loved Caden so long ago and tried moving on with her life, but unable to do so.

The truth of the world is that we're all alone, without anyone or God looking behind our backs, giving validity to our lives until we slip out of it. The knowledge that everyone also suffers doesn't destroy that selfish desire to be loved either because like the priest said, we all have our own misery, so fuck them, fuck everyone. Our universal desire to be loved and inability to receive universal love makes us intuitively reject everyone. And the truth is worse than that. It's naive to just assume that everyone hates everyone because they don't selfishly care or look at us, no, it's that we just don't fucking notice it. We don't see their suffering because we all mask our suffering from others. We don't tell everyone about our past experience, we don't tell them of our lives. We hide it to protect ourselves and only show off the good side of ourselves. Things that people enjoy. Life experiences, joyful moments, trivia knowledge, philosophical opinions and worldview.

And in the end, all we have to offer to other people is our entertainment value, in the desperate hope that we are liked by other people, to be accepted, to have our existence have meaning. We're alone, wishing to not be alone, until we die. I understand this. I understand that once I die, there's nothing, so make the best of life, indulge in hedonism. But it's not enough, people don't understand. They don't see the suffering everyone has, and it makes me feel more alone.

You told me, in a thread about writing what was on my mind, about a month ago:

>Here's a bit of wisdom ı got from the Sniffing Slovenian: "The minimum definition of the real for Lacan is that which resists symbolization."

>In other words, quit trying to chop everyone and everything into easily digestible bits and then you'll be capable of connecting with something greater than yourself. There's already enough philosophy books filled with generalizations, ch'know? And searching for the unexpected is self-defeating.

But it made me realize, how can I not generalize this loneliness when it is something we all collectively share? All people have is truly their entertainment value. All people have is their life and their life experiences.

>All people have is their life and their life experiences.
The only thing people have to offer is their lives, and life experiences.
You can extend that to monetary or power but those are fleeting and doesn't judge the person but their value.

Jesus fucking christ. Just stop already

The guy that wrote House of Leaves

If one has nothing to say, then they should say nothing at all.

There were people who loved me,
There were people I loved.
Today I blushed
Because of who I once was.

I felt ashamed
Of being, here and now,
The one who always dreams
And never steps out,

Ashamed of realizing
That I can have no more
Than this dream of what
I could have been—before.

A nice poem, mirroring the themes of his movies.

>Like in Adaptation where Nicolas Cage #1 is endlessly anxious about writing a screenplay and people say that Charlie is exactly like him because they both have the same name and job in a meta sense.
lol how can this not be about him

What evidence do you have that Charlie Kaufman acts like the Charlie Kaufman from Adaptation? People take it as self evident and always try to bring the artist in the art and overly rely on it.

I was referring to the part with "his" (the cleaning lady's) mother. Seriously, you've got some major confirmation bias going on here.

Honestly, I doubt I'll be able to convince you of anything. I get the way you're feeling, but I disagree with it. You don't have to try and entertain others, and they shouldn't have to try to entertain you. Genuine love is the acceptance of boredom.

Just look at any interview with him.

One of the ironies is that Caden desperately seeks someone to validate his existence yet always fixates on death where he ignores other people who actually do notice, like Hazel or Sammy. But the world around him is full of suffering and he doesn't care about it. The world doesn't care about him, he doesn't care about the world. Some do, but no one cares about them either unless they selfishly care only about themselves and also chose to ignore the suffering of others.

When Claire loses her mother, Caden seems bored out of his mind. And the same thing happens to Caden when his parents die. No one cares.

I have, he's rather calm and collected. Nothing like the nervous wrecks he shows in his movies.