Adaptation: Just a passion...

Just a passion is what Susan Orlean wanted. Just a passion. She went so far that the desperate search after a passion became a passion itself. She wanted to care so much about something like Laroche cared about orchids. She wanted to feel it, to be in tune with it, to obsess with it, just simply something to care about passionately.

"I suppose I do have one unembarrassed passion. 

I want to know what it feels like to care about something passionately."

Adaptation is one of the most insane movies I've ever seen. The most insane, but the most powerful and entertaining as well. I think I can list this one as one of my favourite movies of all time. Incredible performances by Nicolas Cage, Chris Cooper and Meryl Streep in this tragic comedy/thriller. I think I can add thriller because of its ending... If you know what I am referring to. Little hint: crocodile. 

Adaptation's beginning is remarkable, the thread of the whole movie. It's dark, we hear nothing but Nicolas Cage's voice telling you how pathetic he is. And he will repeat himself throughout the whole movie, so don't forget it : Charlie Kaufman is pathetic. Bald, fat, old, his toenails have turned strange and absolutely very pathetic. Kaufman is a screenwriter and agreed on doing the job of adapting Susan Orlean's novel, 'the Orchid Thief'. But how to write a movie about... flowers? How to write a movie about a woman in desperate search of a passion, talking about orchids? Changing the story by bringing in some action and new events that weren't described in the book? No way, Charlie wanted to write something beautiful about orchids and he was determined. During his way to writing the perfect script, events take a shocking and unexpected turn: Susan Orlean isn't who we ever thought she was and Charlie's twin brother discovered that. 

Susan Orlean is such a fun character in the movie. During the film, she changes from a woman living a normal life with a husband, job as a writer and friends into a drug addict when she meets John Laroche. He takes her into his special world, shows her his fascination for orchids and that led to Susan's fascination for his fascination. How could he love something so incredibly much? She wanted so desperately to feel the same and lost it the search for a passion became a drug addict.  Drugs transported her to another world, which orchids did to John as well, so maybe it was a passion?

Reality or fiction?

One of the tricky things about this movie is that reality and fiction are difficult to distinguish. Susan Orlean and Charlie Kaufman are reality. While writing the script, Kaufman involved himself and Susan Orlean, but the events in the movie never took place (thank goodness), so that is pure fiction. The movie is so well constructed that at the end you've got the feeling that it was real, as if it was a journey into Kaufman's imagination. He writes a script, you see the story behind the writing of the script, and then the movie becomes his script. A movie to pay attention to while watching, but also very fun and tensive! 

I don't own the pictures.

Found them on Tumblr.