The Hot Button
December 18 2002
Act I: The Joy Of Agony, The
Act II: Charlie to Donald to McKee
This is
really the simplest part of Adaptation.
On the surface, it appears to be
embracing Hollywood ideas.
But there is more going on.
And NONE of it is real, until the
end…
Charlie calls Donald to come to work with him.
Donald meets with Orlean.
Donald is convinced that there is more drama than Orlean would admit.
Donald sings completely inappropriate (except as subtext for schizophrenia) song, “Happy Together. “
Donald finds Orlean on Laroche’s porn site and decides they are going to follow her to Miami.
Earlier scene not finding ghost orchid plays again… but this time, they find the orchid.
Laroche tells Orlean that ghost orchid is source for a drug.
Orlean experiences ghost orchid drug …. like green cocaine.
Hyper-real romantic scene with Orlean flailing about in the grass…
Donald drives as they follow Orlean and Laroche.
Charlie decides that he will be the one to go see what’s happening inside of the house that Orlean and Laroche have gone into. Charlie remains in the driver’s seat, though.
Charlie is caught by Laroche and Orlean. The drugged-up, paranoid Orlean decides he must die.
Note: “The drugged up, paranoid Orlean.” The Orlean that Charlie has created in his Donald haze. She has caught him and now, she wants to kill him. Classic anxiety dream.
Charlie drives, held at gunpoint by Orlean, to the swamp. Donald hides.
Donald knocks the drugged-up, paranoid Orlean aside and he and Charlie escape into the swamp.
Donald and Charlie hide. The great story that makes the end of this absurdity inevitable: “You are what you love, not what loves you. That’s what I decided a long time ago.”
This tiny bit of advice becomes the key to Charlie’s survival. It is the answer to the entire movie. Charlie must write the script that his heart wants him to, not the one that he thinks will please Susan Orlean.
Morning breaks. Donald and Charlie head to the road, finally ready to get out of the swamp.
Laroche shoots Donald.
The final words that Charlie speaks to Donald: “Imagine me and you, I do…” Get it?
Charlie is dead. The serial killer of The 3 is dead. But what of the victim, Orlean?
Charlie heads back into the swamp.
Orlean still wants him dead. She can’t tell the difference between The 3’s serial killer and cop. After all, she’s still had her life ruined. It gets worse, Laroche is killed by an alligator, which comes right up out of the swamp of Charlie’s sub-conscious.
“It’s over. Everything’s over. I did everything wrong. I want my life (read: book) back. I want it back before it all got fucked up (read: by Kaufman). I want to be a baby again (read: clean white page of paper). I want to be new.”
Back to Reality.
Charlie repeats “Donald’s” speech about being what you love.
Charlie sits with Amelia. In a bizarre spin on the entire unreality of time and space, Amelia talks about going to Prague and seeing amazing puppet theater… puppet theater that is obviously a reference back to Being John Malkovich again.
Charlie is finally ready to take his tiny step, even if it’s unresolved. He admits to Amelia that he loves her.
And she does what he did to her before… she waffles and changes the subject.
But before she goes, she offers a glimpse of light… “I love you too, y’know.”
The film ends with Charlie in monologue, just as it started. Only now, he is happy. “Kaufman drives off from his encounter with Amelia, filled for the first time with hope.”
One last time, “Happy Together” plays. And up from Wilshire Blvd, flowers grow. And they sing along.
There is one last clue about Donald’s unreality in this movie. After the credits, there is a quote from The 3.
“We are all one thing, Lieutenant. That’s what I’ve come to realize. Like cells in a body. ‘Cept we can’t see the body. The way fish can’t see the ocean. And so we envy each other. Hurt each other. Hate each other. How silly is that? A heart cell hating a lung cell.”
Act I: The Joy Of Agony, The
Donald Of Defeat
Act
II: Charlie to Donald to McKee
Act
III: Imagine Me & You... I Do
(Source)