Time Code (2000)

   
TIME CODE, an experimental film from LEAVING LAS VEGAS director 
ike Figgis, splits the screen into four parts, each following a
different actor or group of actors in and around Hollywood.  The
photography looks video-shot, or maybe lower-grade digital, and
the sound-- well, dialogue and background noise-- is shifted be-
tween frames.  (As well as occasionally *blended* between frames.
Can you say distracting?)  The actors, who include Holly Hunter, 
Stellan Skarsgard, Salma Hayek, and Jeanne Tripplehorn, play ac-
tors and other show-biz types.  Early scenes take place at a tal-
ent agency, where a pitch session is underway.  Plus a screen 
test.  Plus the late arrival of the guy whose wife we've been 
watching in another frame talk to a therapist.  (We've also been 
watching his lesbian mistress in a *third* frame.  She's riding 
to work with *her* girlfriend, whose suspicious that something's 
up.)  Boy oh boy, what a neat idea!  Just think-- four movies in 
one!  And you can't get bored, 'cause you'll be too busy trying 
to follow four stories!  Right?  Wrong.  For Yours Cranky, the 
novelty wore off within twenty minutes.  By the thirty-minute 
mark, I'd fallen asleep.  By the forty-minute mark, I had exited.  
'Nuff said.
 
Grades: W/O

Copyright 2000 by Michael J. Legeros
Movie Hell is a trademark of Michael J. Legeros