The movie Adaptation is just meta-meta-meta, and nuts. Sometimes in the best way, but damn. I don’t comprehend where these visions come from, and how the screenwriters and director communicate well enough to create these internal mindscapes as a visual story that hangs together.
I’ve never read The Orchid Thief, the book which is at the heart of the movie (ostensibly). But a movie about screenwriting a movie, adapted from a book? This takes the Hollywood insider nods of Bowfinger to a highbrow, neurotic extreme… and it mostly works!
The cast is high-powered and hard-core: Nicholas Cage, Chris Cooper, Meryl Streep. Cage plays both twin screenwriting brothers, and this is far, far from his role in, say, The Rock. I did get caught up in wondering how they shot the many scenes where both brothers are on-screen at the same time. Also, the nods and direct inclusion of the movie Being John Malkovich (same screenwriters & director) are amusing.
Don’t watch this movie for an escape, though — you have to pay too close attention.