Reuters
January 2002
PARK CITY, Utah - Success, it seems, hasn't gone to screenwriter Charlie Kaufman's head.
Kaufman, the brain behind 1999 indie hit "Being John Malkovich," in which the main characters travel inside the head of star actor Malkovich, premiered his new movie "Human Nature" at the Sundance Film Festival here this week, and it is just as odd -- and as thought-provoking -- as the former film.
"Malkovich" was Kaufman's first feature film, and his screenplay earned him a nomination for an Academy Award, the film industry's highest honor. While most screenwriters parlay Oscar success into a million-dollar Hollywood deal, Kaufman stayed true to his own vision saw that "Human Nature," which explores people's behavior, was produced.
There would be no big action adventures for the former writer of TV sitcoms, no star-filled Hollywood thrillers or no script doctoring of other writers' screenplays, which are the main ways to cash in on Oscar success.
"I don't know how to do the other stuff, so I don't have any interest in it," he said. "Now I have the opportunity -- I don't want to throw it away -- to do the kind of stuff I want to do, which is so rare and so wonderful and such a treat."
"Human Nature" stars Patricia Arquette as feminist Lila Jute, whose hormonal disorder has left her with long, dark body hair covering her body. Tim Robbins plays research scientist Nathan Bronfman who, while trying to teach table manners to mice, begins dating Lila and eventually marries her.
British actor Rhys Ifans is Puff, a man who thinks he is a chimpanzee until he is discovered in the forest by Lila and Nathan, and taken to Nathan's laboratory where he is trained in the ways of civilized society.
Nathan sees a retrained Puff as his ticket to fame among his peers. Lila sees Puff's education as a repudiation of her former self -- the hair-covered feminist who once withdrew from society, lived alone in the wilderness and wrote best-selling books about the untamed female spirit and society's prejudice.
And there is Puff, who at various times is either naked and grunting in the forest, diaper-clad and learning to speak, wearing a tuxedo and talking philosophy, or in a suit and testifying to Congress. There are lies, lust, electrolysis and the quest for proper table manners.
BUT WHAT'S IT ALL MEAN?
While "Malkovich" used a wacky story about living in another person's mind to talk about love and relationships, "Human Nature" is, perhaps, even wackier in contemplating human behavior. But don't ask Kaufman what it's about, exactly.
"The problem is -- I said this for 'Malkovich' and I don't want to sound like a broken record -- if I say what the movie is about to me, then that is what it's about," Kaufman said. "What I'm striving for is to make something that's complicated enough that people can react to it in different ways."
He said he's always been interested in people whom society deems culturally unacceptable, and basing the film on a woman marginalized by long body hair seemed like a good way explore human nature.
For Kaufman it is also important to make people laugh, and from one of the movie's first scenes in which Patricia Arquette is "Queen Kong" in a carnival freak show, audiences should be laughing. But it may be strained laughter, because it forces people to look a little deeper into their own psyche.
Kaufman is quick to say that he is only the screenwriter, and that much of the film's vision is left up to its director. In the case of "Malkovich" it was Spike Jonze, and for "Human Nature," it was Frenchman Michel Gondry.
But for each movie, Kaufman was involved in the filmmaking, and for "Human Nature," he retained ownership and co-produced the film, which gave him greater control over its outcome.
His third movie, "Adaptation," which is based on the book, "The Orchid Thief" by Susan Orlean, is now in production, and in the future, Kaufman said he wants to direct his own work.
"I'm kind of interested to see, if I took something from inception to finished product, what it would look like. How I would do it. So, I need to do that," he said.
If he does get there, and he likely will given the success of "Malkovich" and audience reaction to "Human Nature" here at Sundance, the movie will undoubtedly be just as odd -- and thoughtful -- as his first two films.
(Source)