Being John Malkovich
The initial goal of many films is to establish a believable world that mirrors our own society. This is to give a legitimacy to the film, to allow the viewer to think about how similar the people on the screen's lives are to their own. Some fantasy films, in contrast, tug at the viewers' imaginations in order to transport them to a fairytale world a long ways away where a magical story takes place. Rarely is a picture set in a world comparable and mistakable to our own, yet strange and quirky. One such film that challenges viewers' glimpses into reality is Being John Malkovich, directed by Spike Jonze. The awkward world of the film is vital because it sets the stage for future peculiar events that must be accepted for the film to make its thematic statement. The film opens in what appears to be a normal city setting. The main character, Craig Schwartz (played by John Cusack) is a down-and-out puppeteer waiting for his big break. His wife, Lotte (Cameron Diaz), works in a pet store and likes to take her work home with her in the form of numerous animal companions populating the Schwartz household. Other than the fact that Cameron Diaz looks strange with her brown frilly hair, a rational world is established. They are a ty
pical young married couple, struggling to make ends meet, experiencing sexual tension as Lotte wants to have a baby but Craig does not seem to be very interested, and living in a fairly old and run-down dwelling. Just as the tunnel leading to the portal is vaginal, the final descent back into the real world is as if the person is being birthed, must now step back and ponder the journey, and realize how they have been reborn by the experience. All in all the film creates a fairly normal and believable atmosphere. By the close of the film Craig is fully absorbed in the world of the film and no longer questions it, for example when he decides that Malkovich should abandon his acting career and take up puppeteering. It is this seamless blending of the absurd with the normal that gives the film its interesting quality. Eventually the film sets itself where even Craig, who originally questioned some incidents, is immersed in the film's bizarre world. Lotte finds the whole idea very sexual, as she describes her belief that the fact that Malkovich has a portal in some way makes him feminine as well as masculine. This idea of falling out of the sky is connected with the idea of birth, as Lotte points out that she feels that she has been shown the light and been reborn by the experience. When he tells a woman named Maxine about the portal, she hardly questions the idea, and never takes a journey herself into Malkovich's head in order to see for herself if there truly is a portal at all. Malkovich's agent, upon hearing his request, says, "Okay, you're a puppeteer. While at many points it is easy to point out how the film could never occur in real life, it is hard to push away the fact that the emotions felt and acts of trickery and desperation really do occur frequently in our world. The most significant absurd idea, which sets the stage for the major theme that is control and its effects on relationships, comes in the form of the portal to John Malkovich's head. The early questionable events allow the audience to take a step back in terms of reality and re-adjust their viewing scopes to simply accept what information the film gives. In essence Craig is the enlightened one, free in a world which the other employees are trapped in a web of miscommunication and naivete. A secretary named Floris for some reason cannot understand what anyone says.
Common topics in this essay:
John Malkovich's,
Cameron Diaz,
Sean Penn,
,
Dr Lester,
Craig Maxine,
Spike Jonze,
John Cusack,
world film,
Craig Schwartz,
John Malkovich,
cameron diaz,
sets stage,
malkovich's head,
real world,
reborn experience,
film craig,
|
Acceptance Essays
