Anomalisa Review (2015)

Beautiful and overwhelming! Anomalisa is a rare take on human insouciance towards things that one becomes accustomed to.

ANOMALISA IS AN EMOTIONAL JOURNEY

I have rarely seen a movie so eloquently shot to capture human emotions in the most vivid way possible. It is unafraid to scale horizons of the bold, yet humble enough to revisit tattered fronts of human nature. The cast is just, well, three people – David Thewlis, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Tom Noonan who weave the character voices to perfection. Jennifer’s voice will make you fall in love with Lisa instantly. Her character is the most relatable one. She is something when she breaks into a candid conversation. It is hard not to feel sorry for her when things go south on her.

BEAUTIFUL ANIMATION

The stop-motion animation that Anomalisa bides by is just magnificent. You can almost read the efforts put in by the director Duke Johnson and Charlie Kaufman to create continuous shots of pizzazz. Ice all that up with brilliant expressions that its characters pack in and we end up with a spectacular flick in our baggage. Screenplay steers to create wonders as we feast on some beautiful words at a haywire juncture.

SPOILER CONNECTIONS FROM THIS POINT ONWARDS

The plot of Anomalisa takes us unto a frontage where we come to realize, that’s how it is. That’s how the world works! People are going to feel incomplete. Love is ephemeral. The moment it meets time, it becomes chaotic. Fills up with indifference and then we start searching for that spark again.

VOICE-OVER CREATIVITY

The most unique thing about Anomalisa is the way it carries the voice-over for women. It tries to portray the indifference the protagonist carries for every woman on the planet through a male cacophonous voice. He is on the prowl for that melodious voice once again, here spark, which let him feel something once. The scavenge ends up taking us to the Anomaly, Lisa. She seems perfect until indifference slays her too.

This movie makes you ponder hard. If you really look at Anomalisa’s story, you cannot possibly take sides. You cannot just feel sorry for Lisa here, and ignore Michael Stone. There’s an Anomalisa in everyone’s life which seems harmonious at first, and then suddenly disintegrates to ruins because of some abomination. You cannot simply ignore the horrific dream he has either. It reeks of Stone’s crude life that is trying to devour him. A stunning representation. Well thought of!

RELATING TO THE CHARACTERS OF ANOMALISA

You can relate to the character in the movie – Aloof from the world, but then a chord just sounds right enough to make you interested again. Then boom! out of the blue something makes it dissonant once again. Well, that’s life for you.

Intelligent take. Bravo!

Anomalisa

8.6

Direction

8.5/10

Plot

8.7/10

Animation

8.8/10

Drama

8.5/10

Editing

8.7/10

Pros

• Extraordinary effort
• Brilliant stop motion animation
• A great tale of human insouciance
• Great characters
• Enthralling drama

Cons

• We could live without the ballsy stuff