Garden State

Went to see the movie Garden State with Dave and Jenn tonight. I liked it a lot, but it's very hard to describe why. It's not a comedy exactly, though I laughed a lot. It's pretty serious, but again, I laughed a lot. I will say this: I doubt you have ever seen a movie quite like it. It's about a guy who has been on Lithium for years and comes home to New Jersey for his mother's funeral. He gets back and finds that a lot of his old friends and acquaintances are leading the same kind of non-existence he they were when he left for Holywood years ago. While visiting a neurologist, he meets a very quirky girl (Natalie Portman) and develops a relationship with her and tries to figure out what has become of his life. Natalie Portman is, by the way, a really good actress it turns out. I thought she was hot in the Star Wars movies, but not necessarily a great actress and all. I was pretty impressed with this performance. There was one part where she goes into this stream of consciousness ramble for about 45 seconds where I could not stop laughing. Anyway, most of the people in this movie are pretty strange, and coming from me, that means a lot. I think if you like quirkier movies (Napoleon Dynamite, Charlie Kaufman's work, Lost In Translation, The Royal Tenenbaums come to mind) I think there's a good chance you'll like this one.