Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #20911 in DVD
• Released on: 2002-12-10
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: English
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 96 minutes

From Amazon.com
This fascinating comedy questions what we mean when we use words like "nature" and "civilization." Lila (Patricia Arquette, Lost Highway, True Romance), a nature writer who grows hair all over her body, falls in love with Nathan (Tim Robbins, The Player, The Hudsucker Proxy), a scientist attempting to teach table manners to mice. While hiking in the woods, they discover Puff (Rhys Ifans, Notting Hill), a man raised in the wild since childhood, whom Nathan seizes as a test subject for his experiments--and soon these three, along with Nathan's French lab assistant (Miranda Otto) are embroiled in criss-crossed love affairs as they (and the audience) attempt to figure out what it means to be true to one's own nature. Though Human Nature isn't as surefooted as Being John Malkovich (which was also written by distinctive screenwriter Charlie Kaufman), it has moments of startling comic genius. --Bret Fetzer

Review
Human Nature, screenwriter Charlie Kaufman's follow-up to Being John Malkovich, doesn't match the earth-shattering mix of originality, hilarity, and insight of his debut film, but it comes closer than most movies. It's an hour-and-a-half of solid entertainment. Kaufman shows signs of a unique genius that could only have developed during countless hours spent watching television. Visually inventive French music video and commercial director Michel Gondry makes his feature debut with Human Nature. Unlike Spike Jonze, who directed Malkovich, and was one of the producers here, Gondry sometimes struggles to find the right tone. The palette occasionally seems too bright and cheery, and some of the characters too oblivious to the absurdity of their situations. The cast is mostly terrific, however, especially Australian actor Miranda Otto as Gabrielle, the enigmatic lab assistant with the French accent, and Rhys Ifans as Puff, whose father was a madman who dropped out of society after JFK's assassination, and raised Puff as an ape. Ifans may not have deserved all the attention he got for his relatively simple goofball role in Notting Hill. But here, he sinks his comedic chops into what is basically the role of a lifetime. Like much in the film, Puff is simultaneously ludicrous and charming, and there aren't many actors who could play the character with such physical and verbal grace. The film alternates self-conscious dopiness, as in Puff's impassioned testimony before Congress, with an almost lyrical absurdity, as in Lila's (Patricia Arquette) sudden burst into song. Meanwhile, Human Nature raises thought-provoking points about the lengths people go to in order to be accepted. It also manages to generate a great deal of sympathy for its weird, misbehaving characters, much as Being John Malkovich did, and that in itself is quite an accomplishment. ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide

On the DVD
Widescreen & fullscreen versions
5.1 Dolby Digital Surround Sound
English and French Stereo Surround Sound
English subtitles and closed captioning
Theatrical trailer
DVD-ROM content:
Original website

Customer Reviews

It's only human nature
Men raised as apes. Mannered mice. Women with bad body hair days. Don't expect anything halfway normal in the ironically-titled "Human Nature," the first collaboration between the brilliant Michel Gondry and even more brilliant Charlie Kaufman. Forget style above substance -- this is a thinking man's comedy, quirky and utterly hilarious.

It opens with a dead man, a convicted woman, and a genteel simian-man all speaking of their pasts: Lila (Patricia Arquette) became horribly hirsute when she was a teen -- by twenty, she was "Queen Kong" in a sideshow. Miserable, she retreated to the woods and became a reknowned nature writer. During electrolysis treatment some years later, a nurse offers to set her up with a desperate guy: Nathan Bronfman (Tim Robbins), a manners-obsessed scientist who is teaching them to white mice.

One day in the woods, Lila and Nathan come across a feral young man they call Puff (Rhys Ifans) -- as explained early on, Puff's father thought he was an ape, and raised his son accordingly. Now Puff is being taught the ways of humanity, as Lila tries to preserve the more primitive things about human beings -- and a warped love triangle results.

Michel Gondry and Charlie Kaufman recently collaborated on the wonderful, poignant "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," so it's not surprising that their first joint film was also excellent. It's the sort of film that can't be easily pegged as one thing or another -- part comedy, part satire, part blinking question mark. Is it human nature to be naked and free, to be civilized and uptight, or does it lie somewhere in the middle? Are we just animals in clothes, or do humans have something more... or less? "Human Nature" doesn't answer all these questions, but it does make you think about them.

Michel Gondry's quirky style -- he directed some of Bjork's best music videos -- suits this equally quirky movie. He keeps the movie jumping quickly from scene to scene, moving fast enough that you never get bored. And he seems like a kind of directorial minimalist (the afterlife is a white room with a white table and white mist). At other times, he takes slapstick to new heights, lightening up the cerebral tone of the comedy.

The surreal flashbacks and oddball comedy (like Ifans wearing a shock collar) give "Human Nature" cinematic style. But the characters are what really fill up the screen -- Arquette does an excellent job as the tormented Lila, particularly during a beautiful musical number in the woods. Rhys Ifans is even better, whether it's as an uncivilized ape-man, or as an eloquent, rather dapper ape-man.

Dorky scientists, civilized simians and hairy women sound like an idiotic basis for a movie, but Kaufman and Gondry transform it into a smart, strange comedy. Definitely not to be missed.

Interesting from beginning to end
Everyone should see this film. It's human/social commentary. Kaufmann has such a wonderful, deep, intelligent sense of humor. Very entertaining. Interesting from beginning to end. And I'm always amazed at how perfect the casting is for Kaufman's movies.

Human is as Human Does
This is, as usual, an amazing script by Kaufman. I wouldn't rank it as high as Eternal Sunshine...but I would rank it above Confessions of a Dangerous Mind.

If you want to see a film that operates as a piece of art, this film is for you. Kaufman's quirky characters are wonderful & wonderfully played by this great cast.

If you don't want to think while watching a film, I recommend running away & watching some silly action film or teen comedy.

And be prepared for hairy naked women!

Great Film!