Je veux juste en finir

Charlie Kaufman channels David Lynch in this eerie, creepy relationship drama that really knows how to get under your skin.

Jessie Buckley, who gave an award-worthy performance in "Wild Rose" last year, does so again here, as a woman meeting her boyfriend's parents for the first time. Much of the film takes place in his car, as they travel to and from his childhood home in an Oklahoma blizzard. These scenes give Buckley and Jessie Plemmons, also giving a terrific performance as her boyfriend, long exchanges of dialogue that tease out the dynamic of this particular relationship, and the dynamic between men and women in general, and a dissection of the film "A Woman Under the Influence" (Buckley recites Pauline Kael's review of the film in character as Gena Rowlands), and includes a stop at an isolated ice cream stand, the film's most Lynchian moment, where a girl with a rash gives Buckley a vague warning. Much of the rest of the film takes place in Plemmons' parents house, where David Thewlis and Toni Collette play versions of Plemmons' mom and dad at all ages, from perky housewife to doddering dementia to dying in a hospital bed, and host perhaps one of the most awkward dinners ever to appear in a film. Then there are the scenes set in Plemmons' old high school, where a janitor (Plemmons as an old man?) roams the halls and doubles of Buckley and Plemmons reenact the ballet scene from "Oklahoma!" in the school corridors.

What is "I'm Thinking of Ending Things" about? If that's the first question you ask before deciding whether or not to watch a movie, you won't like this one. I imagine different people will think it's about different things. Certainly it's about getting old. It's also about getting old without the comfort of believing that life has any purpose, or that there's anything waiting for us in the great beyond. It's about women and their relationships with men. It's about Jessie Buckley's character. Until it's not and it's instead about Jessie Plemmons' character, who gets the final scene of the film all to himself, a rendition of the song "Lonely Room" (again from "Oklahoma!") during which he comes to the conclusion that the fantasies on which we build our lives don't exist and we have to take whatever we can to most closely approximate them. It's a claustrophobic and deeply unsettling film, as much because of its aesthetics as because of its enigmatic mysteries.

Is it a good film? I think it's very good, but I will admit that it didn't linger in my head as much as I thought it would while I was watching it. It kind of made my skin crawl in the moment, but it left me feeling like I was going to get all there was to get from it on a first viewing, and it didn't leave me wanting to watch it again to untangle its riddles.

Grade: A

The hardest part about watching this movie was trying to figure out why I was watching it. At the end, I had to look up interpretations, which I think took a lot of the magic and reflection out of what a movie should be. I wish it would've been a little less abstract, for those of us who watched it independently from the book, and aren't abstract minded enough to pull meaning out of thin air.

Other than not knowing what the hell was happening, the acting was phenomenal, and so was the dialogue. Now off to the library to try to get something useful out of this story.

Usually I recommend people to not watch or read reviews, just enjoy the film in their own way. This one, though, is better if you are well prepared for it. It's a two hour fifteen minute film that requires another twenty minutes for the obligatory YouTube video that explains what you've just seen. Foundflix has a nice Explained for it, but watch or read whatever. Because you need to understand you are going to sit through the slow, oh so slow, dissolution of a man's mind, complete with heavy references to books and films and musicals, awkward scenes that make you want to skip forward, long internal monologues, the whole thing. It is also worth mentioning that this film is based of a book, one that is not written by Kaufman, but right up his alley. You might want to check that out before attempting to see the film.

Once you know you are going to see that, you won't feel cheated when finally starting to watch the movie and realizing it will not entertain you at all. Maybe it will make you ponder the nature of reality and inner life, maybe it will make you grab a gun and kill yourself or your parents, maybe it will make you write a dissertation on it, so other people get what you got or at least friends will honor you for surviving through it, but relaxing entertainment or any sort of pleasure that is not purely intellectual you will not get.

There are no twists at the end, the basic premise is made clear rather soon and from that moment you will wait for the film to end. There is no hero journey, no big reveal of information that will guide you through life, no story. The only beautiful thing in the movie is Jessie Buckley. So get into your Dostoyevski reading mood or whatever and only then attempt a viewing. Just trying on a whim and then complaining about it won't cut it. You have to work to see this film. Only when you're prepared to do that work will I recommend it to you.

Sure - after reading the helpful review on imdb that explains the plot, some of the film makes sense. And if you have read the book, Kaufman's surreal approach may be somewhat interesting. If you haven't, this is just a fevre dream that goes nowhere, and is clearly trying very hard to be intentionally incomprehensible. The acting is very good, but that's where the positives end.

Important note: this is not like watching David Lynch at his most weird, where the paranoia is genuine and tongue-in-cheek and the search for meaning a lost cause, but more like a deliberate attempt to confuse the viewer, by withholding information and concealing (WHY) a story that is actually there. And that just feels like vain self-indulgence

This movie cannot stand alone. It is meaningless if you have not read the book. Kaufman spectacularly fails to bring the book to life as an independent story.

But the "spectacularly" in that sentence is not entirely about the failure... rather that he fails while presenting something rather spectacular. The film is gloriously beautiful in the way he brings symbolism and metaphor to life. It is gorgeously filmed and very well acted, although the pacing and editing could use a little less ego and a little more attention to flow. Other directors may have made some different choices in presenting those things that were more grounded in reality as opposed to those that were surreal. Instead, the whole thing was presented in such a state of hyperreality that finding the kernels of truth were impossible.

The biggest failures come in the stark omissions: Kaufman's refusal to share what question is being referred to in those phone calls where the disembodied voice says "there is only one question..." That question is critical and is specifically laid out in the book. It is the entire meaning and motivation. He also fails to ever tie back that question, and the titular phrase, to the only character to whom they actually matter. He also fails to show or explain explicitly what happened to that character in the end, and without that ending, there is no meaning. The film just becomes a very beautiful companion piece to the novel, highlighting some scenes and lending new imagery to them. It is not, in itself, a complete story. It's more of a "mood."