Movie of the Week- Adaptation

My department at school is putting on a series of film screenings, every other Sunday night, of books that have been turned into films; each one is introduced by a professor from the department.

Tonight's movie was Adaptation, and it was introduced by my Western novels prof. I'd never seen the movie before, and hey, how can you go wrong with free movies on the big screen with comfy seats and everything?

English profs seem to be big into the meta-textual thing right now- books within books, books about books, that kind of thing. And seeing as Adaptation is a movie about a screenwriter writing a screenplay about writing a screenplay of a book which becomes the screenplay for this film, this is about as meta-cinematic as you can get. Especially when you consider the fact that one of the fictional characters in the movie is credited with co-writing the screenplay.

For a quirky, twisted, self-referential movie, Adaptation was actually quite entertaining. It was funny, poignant, and has a stellar cast. Meryl Streep & Chris Cooper are of course fantastic, and although I normally don't really enjoy Nicholas Cage, he was good here. Watching it made me want to go find the book that the screenplay about a screenplay is based on- The Orchid Thief.

This is a good movie if you're in for something a bit more cerebral, alongside some good old thriller, shoot-em-up moments (when Donald takes over and starts writing a standard script.) I'm looking forward to our next screening- Titus, starring Anthony Hopkins. Check out the IMDB site...is it just me, or are my profs choosing totally oddball movies?