Very good review. You summed up all of my feelings about the movie. I think the conventional Hollywood stuff threw me for a loop, so it made my feelings for the last half of the movie wane a bit. But, if you think about it, it makes perfect sense, and I give Spike Jonze and Charlie (and Donald?) credit for not winking at us during those final scenes to tell us that it was all a joke...

Holy shit! Now I know why "Donald Kaufman" got a screen credit. "He" wrote the last half of the movie! Ha ha...but yo, that shit is a stroke of genius...I would have loved to have been there during Writer's Guild arbitration...

But yeah, maybe I'll peep it one more time, knowing what I know now. I was entertained by the first half, but like I said, the second half threw me a bit. This is one of those movies my boss says if "for filmmakers and film school students." But whatever, it was alright.
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"A Friend in Need is a PEST."
-Bobby "The Brain" Heenan