It means when something is referred to indirectly by naming a small part or alternatively a whole part. Confused? you will be.
Hypochondriac playwright Caden receives a grant to create his masterpiece. This play drags on for years and becomes more elaborate and pointless and he recreates New York inside a giant warehouse, casts doppelgangers to play versions of himself and watches as they live more fulfilling relationships than he does.
Ultimately the play seems like it will never be completed and Caden remains alone and unable to accept any part of his life, the good or bad parts. All too late his life is over without ever having lived it or realising that the shitty, sad and difficult parts aren't failures but actually make up part of the living.
Starts off really interesting. Catherine Keaner is fantastic as always and Phillip Seymour Hoffman perfect as the morose Caden (but how did he end up with a woman like Adele?) however some way into this very long seeming 2 hours, maybe when Caden becomes his ex wife's cleaning lady or when he casts Ellen Barkin to play himself, the film just becomes a collection of short peculiar scenes, somehow detached from the whole of what should be a moving piece of film.
NO - starts off tight but soon unwinds into a mess.
