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Charlie's back from Venice after premiering How To Shoot A Ghost, and this week the Guardian had a chat with him about his career trajectory, filmmaking problems and the state of the world. You know, CHEERY STUFF. Snippets:

I ask whether he can see beauty, too. “I can,” he says after a long pause. “I have a lot of anxiety. And I think that gets in the way of the experience of being alive.”

[...] Kaufman and Gondry spent several days in 1998 driving around Hollywood, pitching the idea for Eternal Sunshine to studio executives. “I had an infected tooth,” Kaufman grimaces. “I’d never been in such pain. But I didn’t have time to go the dentist because we were doing this.” Positive responses offset his agony. “Everybody was, like, ‘It’s a new way to tell a love story’. They knew how to sell it and that was exciting to them.”

[...] “Though the people who own the rights report back to me regularly that it’s still in the red,” he says dubiously. “‘Hollywood accounting’ is what it’s called.” (Source)

We've heard before that the rleease of Memento took the wind out of Charlie's sails for a bit, thinking the reverse-chronology gimmick was too similar to Eternal, but I'd forgotten about another movie from that period:

John Woo’s 2003 science-fiction thriller Paycheck, released before Eternal Sunshine but now fittingly forgotten, also gave Kaufman a fright. “The trailer showed Ben Affleck with this memory-erasing machine on his head,” Kaufman recalls. “Michel and I were, like, ‘Holy shit!’ We called one of our producers and said, ‘We can’t put the movie out now.’”

On the state of movie-making today:

Would it be intolerable for him to take on a movie he didn’t believe in just to get the clout for his own projects? “I think the world is in a terrible, terrible situation right now,” he says, his tone suddenly grave. “I don’t think that Hollywood has nothing to do with it. I could argue that Hollywood has everything to do with it. And I have a responsibility, as I see it, not to put garbage in the world. I’m not going to do that. If you start trying to figure out what it is that people want, you are doing what AI does. The idea of AI precedes AI itself because that’s the Hollywood machine. It’s why they remake the same five movies every 10 years. It’s why they have a formula for what a movie is.”

[...] “The most valuable thing to me in terms of my mental health is to read a poem or see a painting or listen to music which speaks to me, which breaks me open for a moment, and where I feel an experience honestly and delicately portrayed. That’s another reason AI can never create anything artistically. It can trick us into thinking it has, but it doesn’t have the experience of being alive. It doesn’t know loss and joy and love and what it feels like to face mortality. I’m very worried about the future in so many ways, and if we don’t allow ourselves to connect with other humans who have the experiences that we have, then I think we’re lost.”

Charlie and Eva HD will be at the Calgary Film Festival this month, and on 21st September you can see them speak at the Contemporary Calgary Auditorium:

Good interview with indieWIRE this week, in which Charlie and Eva talk How To Shoot A Ghost, The Memory Police and Later the War. Couple of bits and pieces:

How did you land on the character having blue hair? You’re reminded of Kate Winslet in “Eternal Sunshine.”

Eva H.D.: That was [Jessie]! She bought that for 10 quid.

Kaufman: She said, “What if she had a blue wig?” She said, “I found this thing online.” She bought it, and she styled it. I can’t make decisions based on things like that [such as the connection to “Eternal Sunshine”]. People have determined that I fixate on certain things because they’re accidentally things that happen. Here’s an example because it’s meaningless: That I cast Jesse [Plemons] and Jessie [Buckley in “I’m Thinking of Ending Things”] because their names are the same, and I was making some comment. No! It was [originally] Brie Larson and Domhnall Gleeson. They both couldn’t do it. I had no idea who Jessie Buckley was at the time. I called a friend of mine, a production designer, and said, “I need somebody for this role.” She was working with a director in England at the time. I looked at the “Beast” movie [she was in], and said, “OK, I want this person.” And I got her.

[...]

Charlie, is there more anxiety or liberation in the short-film format as opposed to a feature? The life cycle of a short film is less traditional. Does that affect your outlook?

Kaufman: I couldn’t make this as a feature. I can’t even make the features that I write that are more narrative. It’s very difficult to get financing. It’s easier to get financing for [a short], but the downside is that no one is ever going to make any money on it. You have to piece together financing. I don’t need, like in “Jackals,” there were no movie stars. We happen to have Jessie in this, which is great for us, because she brings so much to it. There are all sorts of equations when you’re casting a feature to get financing. This person who is of this value, and it’s garbage. I don’t have to deal with that for a short. It’s a lot of work. It’s not like it’s less work. We’ve been working on this forever, and there’s no payoff.

[...]

Kaufman: We’re working on getting [“Later the War”] going. We had to rethink it. I don’t know what to say about it. We’re still working on getting it going, and I’m hopeful, and it’s very good!

On The Memory Palace:

Kaufman: I adapted that from a novel, and Reid Morano is directing it. I stuck to the book. There are things, as you know if you’ve read the book, that you need to figure out because they’re kind of abstract in the way it’s described. But [my screenplay] follows the book.

Click on through for the full interview!

Charlie's in remarkably good spirits in the latest episode of Hollywood Reporter's podcast, It Happened in Hollywood.

He's there mostly to revisit Synecdoche, New York with host Seth Abramovitch, but they cover a lot of other ground as well: Charlie's start in TV, Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine, How To Shoot A Ghost, and from the horse's mouth we have some further info on what's up with Later the War. 

Honorary BCKster u/pavingmomentum typed up a little transcript of the War part:

The interviewer asks about a film that he was shooting in Poland with Eddie Redmayne. Kaufman corrects him and says that it was in Belgrade, Serbia.

"We had some problems. We're trying to regroup now, see if we can get it made, but it hasn't happened yet."

The interviewer then asks: "Not to give away too much, but it has something to do with dreams and dream manufacturing, something like that?".

Kaufman: I mean, ostensibly. I mean, there's sort of a story within the story in the form of a film. The main character is a filmmaker who is very, very, very, very, very, very popular and very successful, and he's also a physical comedian and he stars in his films and he directs them and he's making an effort to be taken seriously.

Interviewer: Sounds like Jim Carrey.

Kaufman: It's not like Jim Carrey, not really. He’s not a comedian [in that sense]. I would say he’s more like Buster Keaton in terms of the physicality. Also, Jim’s not a director. This guy is a director, and he’s not based on any one person. I don’t think there is a person who fits that description. Certainly, I think about Jim when I think about physical comedy, and that’s been a big part of figuring out what the look of this comedian’s work is, because I want it to feel singular. Jim is so extraordinarily singular in what he's able to do. But I didn’t want it to be like Jim Carrey; I wanted it more like Buster Keaton I guess, more like a silent comedian. What I was talking about? I was telling you...

Interviewer: Well, I’d asked about the dream aspect.

Kaufman: Right. In this new iteration, he’s making serious movies, and there is one that sort of you see him making, and you see the movie throughout the story. You see a lot of his movies throughout the story and it's very fractured. It is, in itself, very dreamlike. The whole movie is very dreamlike in the way it's constructed. But there is a story about a dream factory that is the basis for a movie that he is making and starring in, if that makes any sense.

Interviewer: And the title of the film?

Kaufman: Later the War.

Interviewer: Well, I certainly hope I get to see that film. So best of luck with it.

Kaufman: I hope so too. I would love to see it as well. (Source)

So they did pack up, but it's not dead yet.

Hollywood Reporter have a little article on the episode.

Thanks to Julie and u/pavingmomentum!

Charlie K and Michel Gondry will be in town for Bristol's Encounters Film Festival later this month, and on 24th September they'll attend a special Eternal Sunshine screening:

Encounters is delighted to announce that visionary filmmakers CHARLIE KAUFMAN and MICHEL GONDRY will be reunited on stage on Wednesday 24th September followed by a special screening of the iconic, Academy Award winning ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND.

Charlie and Michel will then stay on at the five day festival to introduce the UK premieres of their latest works – Kaufman and Eva HD’s How To Shoot A Ghost, starring Jessie Buckley and Josef Akiki, showing as part of Encounters’ international short film competition and Gondry’s witty, family-friendly feature-length animation Maya Give Me A Title, winner of a Silver Bear at this year’s Berlin film festival.

For our 30th edition, we couldn't think of a more perfect way to launch than by reuniting these two visionaries who embody the experimental spirit that Encounters has championed since 1995. These masters of mind-bending creativity have spent the last three decades redefining what's possible in film, and their reunion on our stage perfectly honours our shared history in bold, original cinema.

But we're not just looking back. The UK premieres of their thrilling new works prove that true innovators never stop pushing boundaries and we are delighted to be presenting them (alongside 44 other premieres) in our jam-packed September 24 to 28 programme.

Encounters 2025 takes place from Wednesday 24 September to Sunday 28 September at venues including Bristol Beacon, Watershed and Arnolfini.

More than 100 shorts from over 50 countries have won through to the festival’s globally renowned competitions, with new works by Simon Ellis, Mark Jenkin and Ida Melum among them, and the acting talent on view including screen appearances by Benedict Cumberbatch, Emma D’Arcy, Marianne Faithfull, Claire Foy, Domhnall Gleeson and Juliet Stevenson.

Festival Pass and Industry Pass holders, along with Bristol Beacon members, will have exclusive access to ticket pre-sale from 10am on Thursday 4th September. General release tickets will be available from 10am on Friday 5th September via the Bristol Beacon website. (Source)

Tixkets and more info available at the link!

Mentioned this briefly earlier today, but in an interview with Filmmaker Magazine to promote "How To Shoot A Ghost," Charlie made passing mention of a film being shot in Belgrade, which is probably Later The War.

Kaufman: One of the things I really liked about the idea of shooting in Belgrade for this movie that we’re going to make is that it’s such an interesting visual environment, and I want to take advantage of that. (Source)

Good news!

Nice interview from Filmmaker Magazine, in which Charlie and Eva HD discuss "How To Shoot A Ghost."

Charlie also lets slip about "shooting in Belgrade for this movie that we're going to make," so it seems like Later The War is still a go and reports of its demise were probably BS. YAY.

Little snippet:

Filmmaker: And then how did it turn into a 23-minute film with high production values and great actors? It’s not like a little experimental sketch.

Kaufman: I think it started as something more modest. We thought we could do it for less and in less time.

HD: I first wrote something, and Charlie was like, “It’s expensive to have actors talking to each other.”

Kaufman: It’s more expensive to shoot sound, yeah.

HD: And so then I was like, well, it could a poem about Athens. And then he was like, “You know what? You shouldn’t worry so much about it.” And then it ended up being more of a combination of those, and we did keep the story of the two ghosts instead of just making a city poem.

Filmmaker: But it’s mostly without sync sound — recorded dialogue — right?

Kaufman: It’s all voiceover. And that felt that felt good to me, that these ghosts would not be chatting with each other. They communicate in a sort of non-verbal way. (Source)

Meanwhile, here's a pic of Charlie, Eva and Josef Akiki at the premiere of The Smashing Machine in Venice:

Thanks to u/pavingmomentum!

Trailer has arrived! "How To Shoot A Ghost" will premiere in Venice in September.

The visuals give me Eternal Sunshine vibes, but I don't anticipate the short film will be much like Eternal.

We're 1/4 through this century(!!) so everyone's doing lists, and the latest comes via The Ringer with The 101 Best Movie Performances of the 21st Century. Two performances come by way of Charlie's films.

81 Jim Carrey as Joel Barish, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

Ace Ventura has never gotten his Oscar, alas; he has settled instead for being Two-Time Golden Globe Winner Jim Carrey. Did he deserve one for playing Andy Kaufman? Maybe. Did he deserve one for playing Truman Burbank? Probably. But Lord Jim did his best-ever work in Michel Gondry’s bleak, whimsical, chaotic, and heartrending 2004 tragi-romantic fantasia, precisely because the funniest (arguably) and hardest-working (inarguably) comedy superstar of his era doesn’t try to match either the whimsy or the bleakness.

Carrey doesn’t overact, and he doesn’t overact by underacting the way most prestige-hunting comedians do. Instead, as Joel—the soft-spoken introvert, the nice guy, the red-flag-waving “nice guy,” the heartbreaker, the heartbroken—our man plays everything masterfully straight, affable, and potentially lethal, with his most devastating (and romantic!) lines delivered as casual asides. “I remember that speech really well,” he whispers; “OK!” he concludes, with a shattering, tossed-off charm that wins over both Kate Winslet and several subsequent generations of hopeless (and devastated!) romantics. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’s high concept and higher melodrama would’ve swallowed up both lesser and harder actors; Jim Carrey, here and maybe only here, delivers an absolute masterpiece of perfect balance and total control. Against your better judgment (and possibly his), you will fall for him again, every time. —Harvilla

35 Nicolas Cage as Charlie and Donald Kaufman, Adaptation (2002)

One of the weirdest, most ambitious movies of the past 25 years requires not one, but two of its weirdest, most ambitious performances. Adaptation begins, literally, with the creation of all life. It culminates in Cage playing the legendary screenwriter Charlie Kaufman—in a film written by Kaufman—and his fictional twin brother, Donald, who are less foils than the two ends of a snake eating its own tail. To call the whole thing self-reflexive doesn’t even begin to cover it. Cage observed and interviewed Kaufman extensively to play the part, after which Kaufman would watch a nervous Cage perform him. Round and round they went, until all of that layering self-consciousness rendered one of the most prolific actors of his generation unrecognizable. 

Cage’s Charlie is more neurosis than man. Cage’s Donald, by contrast, is either too dumb or too smart to get in his own way. Together, the two performances uncork one of the best movies ever made about the creative process, in all its high-flying self-importance and low-hanging hackery. Watching it feels like a miracle. Adaptation shouldn’t work, and in the hands of just about any other actor, it couldn’t work. Yet Cage manages to double sell a movie about failing to write a movie, stepping over every potential pitfall to show how the truth makes it through to the other side. It’s beautiful. It’s unwieldy. It’s Cage. —Mahoney

#1 goes to Naomi Watts as Betty Elms/Diane Selwyn, Mulholland Drive (2001).

Thanks to Tim!

It's so weird to think Adaptation is 23 years old and came out a few months after I launched BCK.

Similarly to the New York Times, Rolling Stone have put out a feature on their 100 best films of the 21st century so far. Also like the Times' list, Charlie is in there.

17. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Would you scrub an ex-lover from your thoughts? Mild-mannered Joel Barish (Jim Carrey) — glum, shy, rooted in a lifetime of minor humiliations — is devastated after splitting with wild child Clementine Kruczynski (Kate Winslet), a restless motor-mouth with rainbow of rotating hair dyes. Luckily, there’s a radical cure for heartache: selective memory eradication (and a slight case of permanent brain damage), courtesy of the eraser guys at gonzo medical outfit Lacuna Inc. Then a regretful Joel changes his mind and decides to resist the treatment and cling to the withering past. Music video director Michel Gondry applies his virtuoso surrealism to this giddy tale of human sadness, enlisting Hollywood’s favorite absurdist romantic Charlie Kaufman to pen his wise, Oscar-winning screenplay about the futility of a world-forgetting peace of mind. —S.G. (Source)

It sits between ‘Inside Llewyn Davis’ (2013) at #18 and ‘Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood’ (2019) at #16. ‘There Will Be Blood’ (2007) topped the list.

Thanks to Tim!