海角大神

鈥淎nomalisa鈥� is another fantasia from the perfervid imagination of Charlie Kaufman, the screenwriter of 鈥淏eing John Malkovich," 鈥淎daptation," and 鈥淓ternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.鈥� Kaufman demonstrated聽a fondness for puppets in 鈥淢alkovich鈥� and now, with 鈥淎nomalisa,鈥� a stop-motion project co-directed by Duke聽Johnson, he has made a movie inhabited entirely by figures made of felt. The wonder, the astonishment, is that these puppets are invested with a full range of human emotion.聽

The film is聽about Michael聽Stone聽(beautifully聽voiced by David Thewlis), a motivational speaker in the service聽industry with a new book out called 鈥淗ow May I Help You to Help Them?鈥� A transplanted Englishman living in Los Angeles with his wife and young son, Michael is first seen flying into Cincinnati, where he is due to give a lecture the next day before flying back.

He seems deadened by the聽thick聽gabble of small talk on the plane and the anonymous bustle in the airport. He wearily engages with聽a talky cabbie on the ride to the hotel, an upscale establishment named Al Fregoli.聽That聽monicker is聽Kaufman鈥檚 little in-joke, except the joke聽is all-encompassing: Fregoli is a delusional condition in which paranoiacs believe they are being tormented by a single person hiding behind multiple disguises.

Michael isn鈥檛 necessarily paranoid, but the movie registers his聽psychic聽unravelment by rendering聽all but one of the people in the film with聽essentially the same face and voice.聽(The flat, affectless intonations are all聽by Tom Noonan.) The one exception is Lisa (voiced by Jennifer Jason Leigh聽at her best), whose sprightly speech, which Michael first hears outside his door, lures him聽like a siren鈥檚 call聽into the hotel hallway.聽She is the anomaly in his world 鈥� his 鈥渁nomalisa.鈥�

But before he encounters Lisa,聽one聽of the first things he does after聽he checks into his room is call聽up聽out of the blue the聽old flame,聽still living in Cincinnati, that he walked out on 10聽years earlier. Bella, when she finally agrees to meet Michael for a drink in the hotel bar, is a seething bundle of resentments, and the聽reunion聽is a disaster. Doubling up on his martinis, Michael, whose marriage is clearly on the rocks, acknowledges to her that 鈥渢here is something wrong with me.鈥� This motivational speaker, blurry with聽midlife聽depression, is looking for a reason to motivate his life.

He finds it with Lisa, who, with her friend Emily, also a customer service rep for an Ohio聽baked goods company, is聽staying聽at the same hotel聽to hear Michael鈥檚 lecture.聽(Few other movies, besides "Lost in Translation,鈥� perhaps, have been this good at depicting the聽steady-state聽vacuity of the generic hotel experience.)聽Mousy, insecure,聽smitten by聽her idol聽Michael鈥檚 attentions,聽Lisa聽can鈥檛 quite believe he is interested in her. She is wary enough to regard with some suspicion his offer聽to mix her a drink in his聽room, but what follows is one of the stranger sequences in the annals of animated film: a nuanced, awkward聽seduction, graphically rendered yet immensely touching, between two lost souls.聽Their physical nakedness is matched by their emotional nakedness. Thewlis鈥檚 line readings are resonant, beseeching, and so are Leigh鈥檚.聽Lisa has a poetic fragility in this sequence, never more so than when she slowly sings, almost in a hush, Cyndi Lauper鈥檚 鈥淕irls Just Want to Have Fun.鈥� She turns it into a soulful anthem.聽

鈥淎nomalisa鈥� began as a 2005 play, written by Kaufman under the pseudonym Francis Fregoli, and staged聽only twice聽with live orchestration by Carter Burwell for his 鈥淭heater of the New Ear鈥� sound-play project.聽A Kickstarter campaign financed the film, and if you sit through the end credits, you鈥檒l find 1,070 names listed for 鈥渟pecial thanks.鈥� The聽stage聽material is immeasurably enhanced in its stop-motion incarnation.

The puppets ambulate聽with a thick grace, as if they were pressing through聽tide pools, and their faces are sectioned as interchangeable masks, with the joints between the upper and lower halves visible. The effect is a creepy plasticity that points up the characters鈥� mutated states of mind, especially in a dream sequence in which Michael鈥檚 anxieties become truly Fregoli-infested.

That dream sequence worried me for a while, because it looked as if the film was morphing聽into the sort of loopy phantasmagoria for which Kaufman has an unfortunate weakness. His 2008 directorial debut, 鈥淪ynecdoche, New York,鈥� was borderline unwatchable, but even his standout successes, like his script for 鈥淏eing John Malkovich,鈥� had a few too many metaphysical zigzags. 鈥淎nomalisa,鈥� ironically, is perhaps his most聽human achievement. Perhaps because of the arduousness of the animation process required to bring them to life,聽using puppets rather than actors (except, of course, in voice-over) frees Kaufman聽to focus on聽what really matters in聽the characters鈥� lives, without a lot of curlicues.

Kaufman once told Charlie Rose on his TV show that 鈥淚 have this very adverse reaction to Hollywood romances. They鈥檝e been very damaging to me growing up.鈥� 鈥淎nomalisa鈥� is a kind of corrective to what Kaufman perceives as the damages of聽happy-faced Hollywood, and yet it shares some of that聽same聽movieland sunniness 鈥� at least as an unattainable ideal. We know that Michael鈥檚 instant infatuation with Lisa, for whom he vows to leave his wife, is not built to last. We know his almost manic high will be followed by a deep despondency. But these disappointments don鈥檛 falsify Michael鈥檚 ache for transcendence. His downfall is that he knows too well what his limitations are. The professional helper is resigned to helplessness. Grade:聽A- (Rated R for strong sexual content, graphic nudity, and language.)