greenmemo Review of Anomalisa

Anomalisa (2015)

Existential cartoon with dazzling animation leaves a lingering feeling of deja vu

[6/10 · 1 January 2016]

I had a feeling of deja vu as I was watching Anomalisa, then I remembered seeing the almost universally reviled Neil La Bute film "Dirty Weekend", which I saw not in its entirety but enough to recognize one too many coincidences. Middle aged man on a business trip?: check; chat with an intrusive cab driver?: check; recommendation from the aforementioned cab driver of a toy store that turns out to be a sex toy store: check; interaction with a much younger female character?: check. Probably Neil La Bute thought an explicit sex scene would be too creepy given the age difference, restraint that Kaufman did not have (these are just toons, aren't they?) Well, I still feel that I need to re-watch Anomalisa, even though I think the philosophical wrap up came a little too late into the movie which is burdened by a lot of flat dialogue. I can easily see someone getting sued over copyright infringement here. Or maybe it's that we all live inside of Philip Kaufman's head and Dirty Weekend and Anomalisa are the same movie because Being John Malcovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind are the only unique ones.