Synecdoche, New York
Synecdoche, New York Image
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Metascore
67 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 34 Critics What's this?

User Score
7.5 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 158 Ratings

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0 out of 10
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  • Starring: Michelle Williams, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Samantha Morton
  • Summary: Theater director Caden Cotard is mounting a new play. His life catering to suburban blue-hairs at the local regional theater in Schenectady, New York is looking bleak. His wife Adele has left him to pursue her painting in Berlin, taking their young daughter Olive with her. His therapist, Madeleine Gravis, is better at plugging her best-seller than she is at counseling him. A new relationship with the alluringly candid Hazel has prematurely run aground. And a mysterious condition is systematically shutting down each of his autonomic functions, one by one. Worried about the transience of his life, he leaves his home behind. He gathers an ensemble cast into a warehouse in New York City, hoping to create a work of brutal honesty. He directs them in a celebration of the mundane, instructing each to live out their constructed lives in a growing mockup of the city outside. (Sony Classics)… Expand

Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 21 out of 34
  2. Mixed: 11 out of 34
  3. Negative: 2 out of 34
  1. Chicago Sun-Times
    Reviewed by: Roger Ebert
    100
    I think you have to see Charlie Kaufman's Synecdoche, New York twice. I watched it the first time and knew it was a great film and that I had not mastered it. The second time because I needed to. The third time because I will want to.
  2. NPR
    Reviewed by: Bob Mondello
    80
    Synecdoche, New York is one heck of a head-trip.
  3. New York Daily News
    Reviewed by: Joe Neumaier
    60
    Hoffman, Morton and Jon Brion's aching score somehow capture the all-too-human need to get things right. If you're in a certain frame of mind, those moments make up for all the stagecraft.
  4. USA Today
    Reviewed by: Claudia Puig
    38
    The film disappoints terribly, too. The directorial debut of such an imaginative and clever screenwriter was a highly anticipated event. His "Being John Malkovich" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" are two of the most innovative and intriguing movies of the past decade. Synecdoche is one of the most maddening.

See all 34 Critic Reviews

User Reviews

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Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 44 out of 70
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 70
  3. Negative: 20 out of 70
  1. jean-do
    10
    Beautifully complex. You'll catch something new each time you watch it. Charlie Kaufman cements himself as the best screenwriter out there. Best movie of the decade and one of the best of all times.… Expand
  2. nhsteven
    8
    I have never seen a move have such divided opinion for a film (Most of the major critics loved it, however.), perhaps not seen since the discussion of the pub scene in Inglorious Basterds, or to a lesser degree the Nicholas Cage remake of Bad Lieutenant.. WalterEgo compared it unfavorably to BerlinAlex, but overreacted IMO, (Grade 2). nboley08 captured well the strengths and weaknesses. (Grade 5)
    Others claimed if you don't like it, go see an Adam Sandler film.
    I have to side on the positive; for some reason I'm obssessed with it.
    It falls under the category of a flawed masterwork (like Miles Davis' **** Brew), and could have been tightened up some, but smoothing out the warts from such an utterance is usually a mistake.
    And yet, Apocalypse Now and Citizens Kane were also called flawed.    … Expand
  3. nboley08
    5
    Very, very polarizing. There are parts of this film that are simply extravagant, then there are parts that are quite tedious and poorly represented. I found this movie about life and time more boring and rambling than anything, but there's so much great poetry within its message, that it's hard for me to completely dismiss it. This film feels more like a dream of random thoughts and events, and needed to be redone into something more sturdy and comprehensible, rather than just messing with everyone's minds with its sadist vision.… Expand
  4. PaulD
    4
    Dreamlike exploration of a creative life whose attention to detail and stellar cast are undone by glacial pace and listless direction. An ambitious failure that shows that Kaufman the writer is best served by a non-Kaufman director.… Expand

See all 70 User Reviews

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