Writer Charlie Kaufman took us inside an actor's mind in Being John Malkovich, one of the most fun-filled trips of 1999, and now he's back with another bizarre inside job of his own universe with Adaptation, which records his struggles to adapt Susan Orlean's non-fiction book, The Orchid Thief, into a screenplay. Other filmmakers have blurred the distinction between film and reality before, using film-within-a-film elements—Fellini and Kiarostami come to mind—but their approaches are subdued in comparison. Director Spike Jonze and Kaufman put this together like virtual reality players observing speed freaks on LSD, though confused detractors will say they are practicing cinematic masturbation (often alluded to within the film).

Beginning on the set of Being John Malkovich, writer Charlie Kaufman (played drolly by Nicolas Cage) plunges us into his insecure world, immediately signaling that this is his story and not primarily about the orchid poacher that The New Yorker magazine staff writer Susan Orlean (Meryl Streep) chronicles in her book. He's contracted to turn the book into a screenplay, but this proves to be more difficult than he anticipated. How does any writer convey enthusiasm about a subject they have no passion for themselves? So many professional writers live lives of quiet desperation, through vicarious experiences and governed by strict deadlines. Such is Orlean's sterile concrete life at both office and home, and Charlie follows suit—his imagination is far more exciting than his reality.

The central character he's writing about sounds intriguing enough. John Laroche (Chris Cooper) is a Florida swamp hayseed/scientist/thief who has teamed up with some enterprising Seminole Indians with ancestral claims on the rare orchids of the Everglades; however, Orlean's book contains so much information about orchids that there's no story to film. It would be like writing a screenplay for Moby Dick based on Melville's chapter about the various whale species without Ahab or any of the crew. Yet Kaufman still strives to make a screenplay about flowers, among some hilarious stream-of-consciousness self-talk and mind game diversions that begin with the dawn of the Earth and follows Darwinian evolutionary theory.

Kaufman doesn't want to make a formulaic mainstream movie, but he can't get beyond the first paragraph until he realizes that he's got to insert himself into the story. The stocky, balding writer begins, "Charlie Kaufman, fat, balding..." and the story takes off—or sputters entertainingly through the writing process. As convoluted as this all sounds, Adaptation flows naturally and will relate to anyone who's ever attempted to create anything or anyone who's ever had self-doubts. That should include most of humanity.

The ensemble cast enhances Jonze's film; great actors serve in cameos, most notably Brian Cox as the ranting, screenwriting self-help seminar instructor/guru Robert McKee—"God help you if you use voice-over!" Chris Cooper, Meryl Streep, and Nicolas Cage take on the four major characters brilliantly—the often overrated Cage turning in his best performance since Valley Girl as both Charlie and his twin brother Donald (the only definite fictional character in the story). Cage's practice Face/Off stint pays off with a more finely tuned bipolar portrayal this time around. Mostly, however, the professional acting allows the film to succeed on its own terms.

And the strength lies in the screenwriting. Although many films have attempted to document the lives of creative artists, Adaptation takes us through the tortuous process. As one admirer of Being John Malkovich expresses a desire to “find a portal” to Kaufman's brain, he dryly responds, "Believe me, it's no fun." After a series of false starts and increasing pressure to put the unfilmable script on paper, Kaufman finds that he must resort to the kind of cliché-ridden Hollywood plots he's so arduously been trying to avoid—multiple personalities, car crashes, torrid love affairs, drug addiction, gunplay, and swamp monsters. But he finds a way to let the audience in on the joke by opening up a portal to his brain, which is certainly much more fun than going through the creative experience firsthand.

For additional pleasure, you can banter with others about what was real and what was illusion for hours—or just head back to the theaters for another look. This time around, Jonze's film goes beyond clever diversion; there's real substance beneath the calculated fakery.