the 4th dimension
“the 4th dimension”, by independent filmmakers Tom Mattera and Dave Mazzoni (making their first film without making it feel like one), is the story of a man named Jack. Obsessive compulsive, alone in the world, and something of a prodigy as a child, Jack lives a life of solitude in a small and rundown house while working for a local shopkeep fixing things. We first see Jack in a snowy field, with voiceover telling us of a dimension beyond our own- this being the 4th dimension of the title. (My first bit of criticism- this voiceover felt unnecessary, as if the filmmakers didn’t trust their story to lure in its’ audience, and didn’t trust its’ audience to understand it; a later use of narration felt more integral to the storytelling.)
It’s easy to compare this film to David Lynch’s “Eraserhead” and Darren Aronofsky’s “Pi,” as others have; on the surface (namely, in the crisp black-and-white cinematography Daniel Watchulonis and evocative score and sound design by John Avarese), the comparison is obvious, but in watching the film- currently working the festival circuit and without distribution- another film came to mind. That film was David Cronenberg’s “Spider”, a psychological study of a man (Ralph Fiennes) whose troubled childhood landed him in a mental institution at an early age; Cronenberg’s film takes place just as he’s released as a grown man, still haunted by the ghosts of his past, now at a halfway house run by a woman whose vicious nature is reminiscent of the woman that would become his stepmother. I couldn’t have guessed how clear such a comparison would become as this film moved towards its’ conclusion, where a mysterious woman, a broken clock, and Einstein’s incomplete Unified Field Theory possibly hold the key to Jack’s isolation. This is the movie “The Number 23” teased us with, but didn’t deliver on, content with playing number games while a more fascinating study in obsession was lying underneath.
I worry I’ve given up too much of the film’s allure in that last paragraph, but in a sense, the mystery of its’ appeal remains intact, the intrigue of its’ structure still unpredictable to the first-time viewer. “the 4th dimension” is a film comparable to the likes of Lynch and Aronofsky but not haunted by them. If anything, it’s reverential to the two filmmakers, iconoclastic talents who hold (along with Charlie Kaufman and Michel Gondry) the proud tradition of cinematic surrealism in the most highest regard. And like the best works of those filmmakers and earlier surrealists (for I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Luis Bunuel as well), “the 4th dimension” is a film whose very appeal lies in working things our for ourself, trying to figure our where it’s headed, yet still finding ourselves satisfied even if we work things out correctly, the sign of a strong and fully-formed surrealist story, even if there are still loose ends to be figured out afterwards.
So what is “the 4th dimension?” The film- which captivated me intellectually, psychologically, and most important, emotionally (and even made me laugh in an early scene of young Jack in class)- provides clues without clear-cut answers. But such is the worth of any film of this kind that we’re allowed to be active viewers, coming to our own conclusions instead of having it spelled out to us (which is the biggest reason the opening narration had me worried). True, this film does explain its’ origins to the viewer at the end (and I wouldn’t dream of doing so here), but our memories of what came before it still hold our attention, and our emotions allow us to further empathize with Jack, still alone, cut off from the world around him…even if it is in color now.
