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In December, EW listed their top 15 performances in film for the preceding 12 months, and Jessie Buckley's turn in Ending Things made the grade.

Jessie Buckley in I'm Thinking of Ending Things

It takes a special kind of performer to carry a movie like Charlie Kaufman's mind-bending psychological thriller, but Buckley does it with apparent ease. She’s the guiding light and a steady presence through the constantly shape-shifting script, flipping between long stretches of poetry recitation and scientific debate and cultural criticism but somehow always remaining coherent throughout. We'd follow her anywhere. (Well... weather permitting.) —Mary Sollosi (Source)

Well deserved.

Happy Birthday BCK! (... a day late.)

Didn't know what I was doing when I built the site, and 19 years along I still don't know what I am doing. But I'm thankful to everyone who has ever dropped me a line or found the site useful in any way!

Thanks peeps. I'll figure it out eventually.

Finally Variety brings us the shooting script for I'm Thinking of Ending Things. I don't even have to be sneaky about posting it or anything. Hooray!

Kaufman, who was also honored with Variety’s Creative Impact in Screenwriting Award at this year’s Mill Valley Film Festival, adapted the script from Iain Reid’s 2016 novel about a young woman (played in the film by Jessie Buckley and literally called “Young Woman” in the screenplay) accompanying her boyfriend (Jesse Plemons) home to meet his parents.

[...] The script is a must-read for anyone curious about Kaufman’s process. If you’ve ever wondered how he describes scenes such as the film’s pivotal dream ballet, your answers are now within reach. (Source)

I'll stick this in the Scripts/Writing section soonly. There are probably already some scripts there you haven't seen before, too.

2020 was a messed up year, but it managed to bring us some good films, and the UK's Independent says I'm Thinking of Ending Things is up there in the top 10. #6, if you want specifics.

The Atlantic features I'm Thinking of Eding Things at #4 in its countdown of 2020's ten best films.

4. I’m Thinking of Ending Things

Charlie Kaufman’s first directorial effort in five years was a strangely perfect fit for Netflix; it’s the kind of film best viewed at midnight, alone in your home, an experience so peculiar that you might wonder if you dreamed the entire thing. Based on Iain Reid’s novel, Kaufman’s movie focuses at first on a young woman (Jessie Buckley) who is going to meet the parents of her new boyfriend (Jesse Plemons) out in the countryside for the first time. But the couple’s jaunt becomes a harrowing, dark night of the soul, as the bounds of time seem to stretch and snap, and it becomes harder to tell whether their partnership is real or imagined. In other words, it’s a Charlie Kaufman movie—a challenging viewing experience that lingers for weeks and unfolds new meaning with every rewatch. (Source)

The Nest, Lovers Rock and First Cow made up the top 3.

The Boston Society of Film Critics Winners for 2020 included 2 for I'm Thinking Ending Things! YAY.

Charlie took out Best Screenplay (runners up: Kelly Reichardt and Jonathan Raymond, First Cow), and Robert Frazen won for Best Editing (runner up: Chloe Zhao, Nomadland).

Nomadland claimed Best Film, Anthony Hopkins was Best Actor, Sidney Flanigan won Best Actress. Chloe Zhao grabbed Best Director, (runner-up: Kelly Reichardt).

Full list of winners and runners-up here.

Thanks to Nathaniel!

If you have 45 minutes to spare, use them on this I'm Thinking of Ending Things virtual roundtable discussion between Charlie Kaufman, Boots Riley, Tamara Jenkins, Yorgos Lanthimos, and Richard Linklater. Via indieWIRE and moderated by David Ehrlich, it's good stuff from start to finish.

Linklater offers CK some advice about dealing with internet commenters, Boots compares Charlie to The Smiths, Jenkins draws comparisons between Ending Things and Virginia Woolf, and everybody loves Charlie.

They are wearing red noses. Why? Who knows! Good interview, though. CK and Jessie talk about what it was like working with each other, food in the movie, Pauline Kael, Oklahoma!, how movies enter and alter your psyche, and more.

Skip to 1:44 for the beginning of the interview.

This one's from last month: Variety held their annual 10 Screenwriters To Watch panel, and afterward there was a half-hour interview with our pal CK.

Things worth noting:

• A melted Charlie in the background (I'm sure I've seen this before, maybe in the real estate photos when he was selling his house last year)
• A surprisingly chipper wall hanging
• WHAT ARE THE BOOKS BEHIND HIM? I can see Antkind, but my eyes won't decipher the others.
• CK's thoughts on LA vs. New York
• Charlie is negotiating a contract for a NEW NOVEL, AW YEAH.
• Eternal Sunshine's title was designed to be deliberately hard to remember. Of course, now it's somewhat ubiquitous. His original title was 47 words long, and his second choice was for the film to have no title at all--neither of which were given the thumbs up, surprisingly enough. I may have heard this before, but I am not sure.

I don't think I can embed the video here, so click on over for a look. Starts a little before the 1:05:00 mark and goes for 30 minutes.

At Bright Lights Film Journal, Joelle Kidd delivers a thoughtful essay on I'm Thinking of Ending Things and men writing women:

I’m Thinking of Ending Things is, like so many stories, a story about a man masquerading as a story about a woman. Which ultimately makes me wonder why we need to spend so much time trying to figure out how to build a better mask. I was disappointed when Lucy disappeared for the final section of the film, not because there was no longer a female character on-screen but because it felt like the moment when the film ceased to grapple with the implications of what it means for a man to craft a fictionalized woman to suit his own narrative, his own purposes – the very thing, of course, that Kaufman is doing, the thing that male writers do, by necessity, all the time.

[...] Charlie Kaufman has the talent, rare even among artists. of the ability to surprise. His films often reveal the assumptions we as filmgoers have about the nature of movies – for instance, the assumed 1:1 relationship between character and actor. Subversions of this have taken place throughout film history, with a single actor playing multiple characters, or multiple actors playing a single character. But what about a character who not only has multiple identities but perhaps no fixed identity? Can a coherent character, who seems like a person in all the important ways, be created out of many people, many personalities? (Source)