Taking a job as a filing clerk on the seventh-and-a-half floor (don’t ask), John Cusack happens across a portal into the head of John Malkovich, the actor. Chivvied along by maneater Catherine Keener, he starts selling tickets to interested parties, but not before his wife (an unrecognisably frumpy Cameron Diaz) has decided she likes being a man so much she needs a sex change operation…
This was the feature debut for director Spike Jonze, after making his name with inspired music videos for the likes of Fatboy Slim and the Beastie Boys, and the first produced screenplay for writer Charlie Kaufman. (They would collaborate again on Adaptation.) There’s real yearning in this darkly bizarre, mind-bending comedy about voyeurism, sex, and the human desire to play God. You can’t get much further out of the box than this.
Staff Pick: Eirinn & Emma
Devilishly inventive and so far out there it’s almost off the scale.
David Rooney, Variety
An incredibly rich and entertaining (not to say, laudably malevolent) film that far transcends its already way-out title premise.
Jonathan Romney, Sight & Sound
Media Partner
Spike Jonze
John Cusack, Catherine Keener, Cameron Diaz, John Malkovich
USA
1999
English
Book Tickets
Thursday August 27
Indigenous & Community Access
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Credits
Producer
Michael Stipe, Sandy Stern, Steve Golin, Vincent Landay
Screenwriter
Charlie Kaufman
Cinematography
Lance Acord
Editor
Eric Zumbrunnen
Original Music
Carter Burwell
Production Design
K. K. Barrett
90s, Baby!
Ten years. 11 weeks. 90 films from the 1990s. This summer, 90’s Baby! takes a deep dive into a defining decade of cinema.
Lessons of Darkness
Werner Herzog's unforgettable documentary reveals the unfolding disaster of the Kuwaitian oil fields in flames in 1991 as a sweeping inferno of mesmerizing power.
Beau Travail
Inspired by Herman Melville's Billy Budd, Claire Denis' transfixing Beau Travail is set in East Africa. Sgt Galoup (Denis Lavant) reflects on his time in the French Foreign Legion, and the impact of the handsome Sentain (Gregoire Colin).
Three Kings
George Clooney headlines David O Russell's bold, brazen attempt to get to grips with the immediate aftermath of Operation Desert Storm, as 4 US soldiers try to liberate a missing shipment of gold amidst the chaos and carnage.
But I'm a Cheerleader
Megan (Natasha Lyonne) is the perfect All-American Girl, or so she thinks. That is until she’s shipped off to conversion therapy. This pitch black comedy is wrapped in a saccharine bow, featuring the icon herself, RuPaul, as a conversion counsellor.
Magnolia
This deeply personal 1999 California opus is ripe for rediscovery. Mapping the emotional traumas of half-a-dozen major characters as they crisscross the San Fernando Valley in search of either recognition or reconciliation, it's PTA's riskiest gamble.
Election
Tracy Flick (Reece Witherspoon) is running for Student President, but Mr. McAllister (Matthew Broderick) has other ideas... This remarkably sour millennial comedy from Alexander Payne (The Holdovers; Sideways; The Descendents) hits twice as hard today.
Ghost Dog: Way of the Samurai
Ghost Dog (Forest Whitaker) is an assassin, but he's also an existential loner who adheres to his personal code. Despite the thriller trappings, this is really a lampoon of that genre, and a melancholy reverie for the cultural melting pot we call home.
The Straight Story
David Lynch goes a different direction in this linear Midwestern about a septuagenarian (Richard Farnsworth) who drives nearly 400km on a lawnmower to visit his ailing brother (Harry Dean Stanton).
90s Surprise Film
The 90s movie we have all been missing... Join us for a celebratory wake for this year's 90s, Baby series! What you will be seeing is top secret (no, not Top Secret!, that was 1984) but it will be at least 26 years old and it will be new to this series.
The Wind Will Carry Us
Kiarostami's dry comic masterpiece follows a Tehrani film team's thwarted attempts to document a traditional Kurdish funeral... Trouble being, there's no one to bury, and, worse, virtually no cell service...
Fight Club
1999 was a very good year for movies, but nothing captured millennial angst quite so vividly as David Fincher's bruising black comedy about what it means to be a man today. This modern classic does everything short of rattling your seat to get a reaction.