Buckland-Warren-Puzzle-Films-Complex-Storytelling-Contemporary-Cinema

5“Frustrated Time” Narration: TheScreenplays of Charlie KaufmanChris DzialoCharlie Kaufman’s scripts exist as a contemporary configuration ofcomplex storytelling – a historical phenomenon with a long genealogy inboth literature and film. Proust’s À la recherche du temps perdu, or filmsinspired by this exemplar of complex narration, such as Time Regained(dir. Raul Ruiz, 2000), have obvious correspondences to the insistent yetstubbornly hazy time frames of Kaufman. His films, such as Being JohnMalkovich (dir. Spike Jonze, 1999) and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind(dir. George Clooney, 2002), sometimes embody what Edward Branigan(2002) terms the “nearly true” or, borrowing and modifying DavidBordwell’s (2002) useful appropriation of Daniel Dennett’s term, a“multiple drafts” style of filmic narration (see Branigan 2002, p. 108).Notably, however, Kaufman’s films always have one foot comfortably withinthe Hollywood studio system, ensuring that major plot elements arealways comprehensible. Thus, Kaufman’s films are not arguably as complexas Proust’s novel or Ruiz’s adaptation, for example, and “multiple drafts”may not be the most accurate heuristic to describe his work. Unlike classicalnarration, which does all it can to hide parallels and alternatives topreserve the illusion of unity, or “forking-path” narratives, such as SlidingDoors (dir. Peter Howitt, 1998), which “flaunt their parallels,” the “multipledrafts” version of narration for Branigan embodies “a relationship amongparallels and alternatives [that] is neither flaunted nor buried, but isambiguous or indeterminate” (2002, p. 107). Although Kaufman followsmany classical conventions, and can’t resist underscoring many parallels,his films also traffic in the ambiguous and indeterminate. Certain elements,especially his use of time, remain indecipherable even after repeatedviewings. In this way, they seem to occupy a more central place between“simple” and “complex” narration than many of the films Branigan usesto illustrate his claims.