Sih-neck-doh-kee

"Hey Charlie Kaufman, here's a big pile of money. Go nuts." That's probably how Synecdoche, New York started. It seems to go off in every direction he can think of, ending up in a confusing but powerful two hours. A playwright constructing a play about his life sounds pretty normal, but here the play is inside a massive warehouse where an entire city can be recreated. A population of actors live inside it, including versions of the playwright and a version of the man who's playing the playwright. Layers and layers get stacked up until you don't know what's real, or what's all a bit of a dream. Years pass without notice, but that seems to be the point. 'There are a million strings attached to every choice you make,' says a fake vicar. 'You can destroy your life every time you choose.' This character seems to feel like that, as everything goes inexplicably and miserably wrong. But still, there's a happier message: 'I will be dying and so will you, and so will everyone here. We're all hurtling towards death, yet here we are for the moment, alive. Each of us knowing we're going to die, each of us secretly believing we won't '. Oh, did I say happy? I meant unrelentingly bleak.

I'm just really concerned about dying in the fire

But still, it is an enjoyable film. A surreal, complex, excellent mess of a film. The poor woman who buys a burning house to live in knows this. She likes metaphors. She's prepared to live in fear of a symbolic death. All this doom can't be good for her. Can't be good for anyone, as the play grows and grows without ever being seen. 'It's been years, when are we going to get an audience in here?'