I really enjoyed the first 2/3 of this interesting Spike Joynz/Charles Hoffman collaboration about trying to write a screenplay about Suzy Orlean’s The Orchid Thief. The last third degenerates into the Hollywood chase/murder stuff that the film is, in fact, a critique of. Nicholas Cage plays Hoffman and his “brother” Donald and does a fine job. Meryl Streep stars as Orleans and is wonderful, and Chris Cooper is amazing as John Laroche, the thief and orchid freak. Another triumph for him. The joke, of course, is that while the film is dedicated to Donald, he doesn’t exist. If we see it on the screen, we’ll believe anything if real characters are mixed with fictional. Here he’s scaling back on the fantasy aspects of “Being John Malkovich” to play another game. The acting is very good and the writing usually works well. Until, that is, the film becomes the kind of film “Donald” wants to write. Easy, stupid, formulaic. That is another part of the joke, but it’s not funny to me. I had to watch that part