Time Code Review

A Hollywood film company, Red Mullet Productions, is preparing an action film, Bitch From Louisiana. Rose, Salma Hayek, an aspiring actress, is desperate to get the lead role and, though she lives with her rich lover, Lauren, Jeanne Tripplehorn, she`s having an affair with Alex, Stellan Skarsgard, one of the company executives, hoping he`ll help her... The plot certainly isn`t the most important element in Mike Figgis` extraordinary, experimental film. What you`ll see in Timecode are four simultaneous images, four inter-connected stories, four movies, in fact. Each was shot on video as a single, continuous take, and they were filmed simultaneously, because the characters often connect from story to story. The cast, which also includes Saffron Burrows as Alex`s wife, Julian Sands as a masseur, Holly Hunter as a company executive, Kyle McLachlan as an agent, Mia Maestro as a director pitching a film project very much like Timecode itself, and Richard Edson as the company`s in-house director, improvised all the dialogue. Even if the plot isn`t exactly original, the boldness of Figgis` concept is truly exciting - he demands a lot from his audience, but the reward is a truly original piece of filmmaking.Margaret`s Comments:This is a really eccentric effort from Mike Figgis - four digital cameras rolling simultaneously for 93 minutes, no edits, no reshoots, four small screens on screen, synchronising the movements of a group of possibly cliched characters - the movie producer - Stellan Skarsgard, alienated in the world, cheating on his wife - Saffron Burrows - with a would-be starlet - Salma Hayek who in turn is cheating on her lesbian lover - Jeanne Tripplehorn. Producers are trying to decide what to produce, directors are trying to decide who to cast. It`s an bravura effort that amazingly works surprisingly well. There are the odd patches that seem forced - the actors improvised, but in fact most carry it off really well, like Skarsgard and Tripplehorn. At least Figgis is pushing the bounds of filmmaking in alliance with new technology.