Timecode

Perhaps because of my love for the independent film I usually enjoy an experimental film. In this class of movie making the medium is the message. The story can take a second place role to the means used by the filmmaker for the presentation. Films like ‘Run Lola Run’ or Hitchcock’s ‘The Rope" use unconventional techniques to present a movie. In fact, The Rope used a technique called mise en scene. In this method the scene of a movie is made with one continuous take, no editing or different camera angles. This provides the purism of a single camera to provide a voyeuristic view for the audience. The Rope used one camera film cartridge of about 9 minutes each. If there is a mistake everything starts again from the beginning. In Time Code director Mike Figgis takes this technique to the ultimate and then beyond. Four digital cameras loaded with memory for 90 minutes of video make the film. Four crews where each given a camera and a part of the cast to follow for that 90 minute period. The result is a film made of four concurrent mise en scenes. The film is viewed with the screen partitioned into quadrants. In quarter shows the results of one camera. The story showcases a tapestry of several adulteries told in four parallel stories. All the cameras are started at the same time and just run. There is a lesbian, Lauren (Jeanne Tripplehorn), rich, addicted to coke and in love with Rose (Salma Hayek). Her love has turned to obsession as she spies on Rose by means of a hidden microphone. Rose cheats on Lauren with a man, Stellan Skarsgard, who plays an alcoholic ad exec. Many notable faces are seen as the cameras shift from one moment to another. You really have to watch the film a few times to get the story line at all.

At times the cameras overlap, showing different viewpoints of the same events. There are side stories that wax and wane through the film. The attention of the audience is focused by increasing the sound in one quadrant while lowering it in the others. This helps to some degree by the typical viewer will still find himself distracted. There seems to be little in the way of scripts. The DVD has two different takes on it. There are signs that some degree of discussion as to what would be said or done where held yet the two takes differ enough to almost be considered different films. Well, not really completely different but since the films where made with four crews and a lot of ad lib it is only natural that the differences start to add up.

The acting is excellent. Tripplehorn is convincing as the power lesbian, outwardly self-assured bit with insecurities and doubts just below the surface. Hayek plays the aspiring actress almost as a self-parody, the typical starlet that is willing to do anything for a good part or to further her career. Among the other stars in this film is Holly Hunter. She plays an executive in meetings to discuss a project of four scenes of a movie on one screen. She is also a producer on this film. All within Time Code there is pokes and prods at Hollywood. How the people in that business take themselves all too seriously. Here we have names in the business biting the hand that feeds them so well.

Figgs has always been one to bend the rules. His Oscar winning Leaving Las Vegas in 16mm film rather then the more standard 35mm. This gave the gritty, realistic look to the film that created the perfect setting for the films characters. Here, he lets his stylistic fantasies take control. His work here is an experiment is semiotics and perception. He is more interested in doing it than whether it will be accepted by the public. I have to give a nod of approval to this. After winning the coveted Oscar he still has the spirit of a film student within. He did not fall into the trap so many Indy directors do, big budgets for big bucks. He had a vision of something to do that he found interesting and did it. Along the way he found others in the business that shared the spirit of adventure and got them involved.

While this film is not for everybody it is a must for film students and other that want to see a film borne form thinking outside the box. The disc is excellent and I am very glad they included two different versions for comparison. It adds more than you could even have experienced at the theater. There is the rated ‘R’ version 15, which was shown in the theater complete with a director’s commentary as well as the unrated version 1 also with commentary. Needless to say the film is in 1.33:1 full screen The audio is listed as 5.1 but there is very little use of the rear speakers and even less for the sub woofer to do.

Posted 11/14/03