Time Code

In art, as in science, we can learn a lot from our experiments, even if they disprove our original hypothesis. Mike Figgis had a hypothesis when he began the experiment that ultimately became "Time Code": a movie in which the screen is divided into four equal rectangles, each containing a single camera's unedited real-time footage of a largely improvised comedy/drama about the movie industry, would be vaguely watchable. Well, this hypothesis falls absolutely flat on its face over the 100 minutes of "Time Code." Still, "Time Code" teaches us valuable lessons for the future if anyone should try this again, and we should all earnestly hope that no one does.

Lesson #1: Dividing the screen into four equal rectangles is a bad idea. Despite what Mike Figgis apparently thinks, there is virtually no way to pay attention to more than one corner of a screen at a time. If Mike Figgis had watched the NCAA tournament before making this film, he would have realized that if one game is playing in one window with sound, he is completely unable to follow the other game. Putting in sound from two or three windows just makes everything exponentially more confusing. Putting in sound from only one window means that three-quarters of the screen is wasted.

One example of the waste: Mike Figgis apparently thinks so much of his reaction shot of Jeanne Tripplehorn, after she has surreptitiously miked girlfriend Salma Hayek to determine whether or not she is having an affair, that he leaves it up there for about thirty minutes. Poor Tripplehorn, already without sympathy from the audience because she is a screaming, hysterical shrew, must smolder wordlessly and statically for what seems like forever as Hayek goes around doing people. Speaking of which, heterosexual males will undoubtedly encounter the Hayek Problem when watching this film: it requires distinct effort to look in any of the squares that do not contain Salma Hayek, for reasons made obvious by Salma Hayek's dress. Theoretically, Figgis could do interesting things with the four windows, but he doesn't; they're just there, randomly interacting.

Lesson #2: We script films because actors can't be relied upon to come up with a plot or dialogue on their own. Of course, "Time Code" is supposed to be improvised around "central elements" of a predetermined plot. Still doesn't work. The actors emphasize things that don't go anywhere, and underplay things that the film needs to make any dramatic sense. Stellan Skarsgård, for example, is supposed to be an object of unquenchable yet unwise lust for two separate women (Saffron Burrows, his wife, and Hayek, switch-hitting). Yet the film gives him time to project nothing other than a vaporous, pulsating good-naturedness, inadequately explaining exactly why he's such a draw for the two ladies. On the other hand, numerous characters seem like they're going to be important and then suddenly disappear, and a lot of people who are onscreen for a long time play no role in anything plot-related.

The "central elements" of the plot don't help things, either, because the actors do not bother to communicate them clearly to the viewer, meaning it's extremely difficult to tell what the hell is going on. In a film where the four screens and their various shiftings have already confused any sense of plot, further obfuscation is inexcusable. The form and the content of this movie both meander endlessly and seemingly without direction for long stretches, leaving the audience high and dry while the actors have a grand time.

On a finer level, you can actually hear the gears turning in Tripplehorn and Hayek's brains, attempting desperately to make up reasonable dialogue, during their big fight scene. Most of the dialogue in this film, in fact, is tentative; everyone shies away from failing and thus completely avoids success.

The fact that all this was improvised does not excuse these flaws; it means the film should not have been improvised, because as it stands it is a wholly inadequate film.

Lesson #3: Movies about the film industry aren't funny anymore. Discussions about proposed movies are supposed to be the comedy element of "Time Code," but almost all of them seem like rejects from "The Player." The only really funny moment, an improvised rap about the Russian Revolution featuring the chorus "Trotsky's in the house, diggy diggy," comes well after the movie has worn out its welcome.

Lesson #4: 93 minutes of unsteady hand-held camera footage will nauseate viewers. Self-explanatory.

What results from all this is not a film that feels daringly real and intimate, which is what Figgis evidently hypothesized would result, but a film that is so poorly made visually, directorially and dramatically that you will feel insulted if you watch it. Which you shouldn't. Probably, given enough time and trouble, Figgis could eventually prove his hypothesis right, but let's all hope he's learned his lessons and doesn't go rushing back to the lab.

DEGREES AND TYPES OF AWFULNESS

Within the space of a month and a half, I have seen two epically bad movies, "Time Code" and "Mission to Mars." It may be mildly interesting to compare why they were bad. "Mission to Mars" was terrible, but it seemed like it was made for human beings. These human beings "Mission to Mars" was talking to are so stupid as to be only theoretical possibilities, and certainly have not been found in nature, but they were human beings. "Time Code," on the other hand, seems designed for some far more advanced species than ours, with its perceptual difficulties. Yet these species would have to be totally ignorant of"acting" and "plot" for the movie to work for them. To sum up, I cringed when I saw "Mission to Mars," over and over again, but I never felt that I was being insulted on purpose. But "Time Code" is the only movie I have ever given the "drawbridge" variant of the middle finger to while the movie was still going on. (If you don't know what the "drawbridge" variant is, ask me to demo next time you see me.)

It may have been the first, but it wouldn't be the last.

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