6) Being John Malkovich
Being John Malkovich is smart, satirical, intriguing, darkly funny, weird, and originally original in every sense.
The movie tells the story of a greasy puppeteer named Craig. He is an eerie and peculiar character who one day discovers a portal into the head of the actor John Malkovich, and is more than happy to escape away from the discomfort of his own skin and into someone else’s.
Charlie Kauffman’s movie flips everything on its head, from turning glamorous Hollywood poster-people John Cusack and Cameron Diaz into haggered oddballs, to a reinterpretation of how people love one another. Malkovich himself admitted that he was kind of horrified when he learnt about the script, and understandably so given how the movie turns the inside of the actor’s mind into a portal to be experienced by a wiling group of crackpots desperate to escape their own lives.
The movie is one of the most imaginative spectacles you’re ever likely to see, filled with wonderful performances and pushed on through some wonderful twists and turns. If the premise sounds a little too odd for you to stomach, Being John Malkovich is probably still worth taking a look at just to see the scene where Charlie Sheen (playing himself like always except this time using his actual real name) discusses the effects of getting stoned with the eponymous star.
At least there’s a little bit of familiarity in that scene.
