Time Code is a boundary-breaking film. I don't know if it really heralds anything new in mainstream filmmaking, but at least we now have this one art house example of how a movie can play with time by leaving it alone.

This is Time Code: In November last year, director Mike Figgis (Leaving Las Vegas) and his team of filmmakers and actors took four digital video cameras and shot this movie in one shot. There are no cuts, there is no editing. The results from the four cameras are presented on the screen simultaneously, one in each quadrant of the screen. The characters wander in and out of different shots, meeting, moving apart. The cameras sometimes capture different angles of the same scene, or other times capture what's happening blocks away at exactly the same time. Time Code is a bright and bold example of the concept of simultaneous timelines.

Is this a case of the filmmaking process being more interesting than the final product? Yes. The characters in Time Code are not fascinating people and do not draw your sympathies. The stories that unfold are sometimes banal; in one case, "simply ludicrous" comes to mind. But this is one of those very rare cases where it is easy to overlook such problems because the filmmaking process shows us something we've never seen before. Many movies have explored the interaction and interweaving of individual threads of existence—the movie that comes to my mind right away is Red—but they have always done so via a single linear narrative style. (That a linear movie can show us this is a testament to the art of editing.) Split screen has also been used to demonstrate simultaneous timelines, but it's usually a temporary device, used sparingly. (Recent example: Run Lola Run.) In Time Code, linearity is brought to its absolute purest form by eschewing editing, and the split screen is constant. We are watching a true 93-minute chunk of four different timelines all at once. Hmm. Sounds like one of those time conundrum plots on Star Trek.

Our modern minds are media savvy, so the bombardment of four little movies at once is not confusing. Nor is it cacophonous, since Mike uses various techniques to steer your attention toward one part of the screen or another. Often, one or even two of the frames contain very little activity, so the corners with action draw your eye. The s ound levels of the four streams are brought up and down at different times, which coerces you to shift your attention to the picture with volume. The fun of all this is that you can ignore Mike's suggestions and let your eyes and ears wander elsewhere. In fact, Mike was at the NuArt in L.A. on Friday night, performing live sound mixes of Time Code for three different showings. I tried to see one of these, but they were sold out. Bummer. The point is that Time Code can be a different movie each time you see it. If you're not lucky enough to have the director performing a different sound mix for each screening, there are still lots of things to miss in a first viewing that can be caught in another.

Again, the story/stories are not terribly inspiring, and the Hollywood setting is so, like, been there, done that, but there are some very inspired comedic, artistic, and technical moments that pull Time Code out of dull experiment into fascinating artwork. [Skip if you want no details.] There's the moment when all four cameras end up shooting close-ups of peoples' eyes. There's the moment when Rose (Salma Hayek) and Alex (Stellan Skarsgård) meet, their separate camera images appearing to join together as one for a brief moment. There's the really funny summary of a Matt Parker and Trey Stone script called Time Toilet that Darren (Steven Weber) discusses in a staff meeting. And, of course, there's the pompous but hilarious pitch by Ana (Mía Maestro) and her boyfriend Joey Z (Alessandro Nivola) that lampoons Time Code itself.

The actors all do an amazing job, considering they had to at once improvise their role within a basic framework and maintain a precise synchronicity with one-another and the rest of the film crew. The results are mixed, but the actors all deserve credit for plunging into this uncharted expanse.

What I'm hoping for is a follow-up, that someone will take this idea and push it to another level. Perhaps something more scripted, more complex, more sweeping. The possibilities are very exciting. This is not going to become a mainstream moviemaking technique, but groundbreaking and mainstream rarely go together anyway. I don't care. I'll be there to see whatever movie takes this ball and runs with it.

U-571 is not a bad movie. I mean, if you've never seen Das Boot, I imagine all this would seem fresh and exciting. Scary depth charges! Dead engines! Flooding! Sonar pinging! Torpedoes! The pathos of young men thrown into battle! The submarine plunging into impossible depths! Sloppy officers' meals! It's all great fun. Das Boot is an intense, disturbing, gritty movie. U-571 is kinda that, but not so much. It's more glossy. It's also a little choppy, wildly implausible, and pathetically routine in its emotions. Oh, I feel I'm just wasting my time.

Wasted time. That's what I felt. I felt like Jonathan Mostow, the writer and director, was wasting my time with his little homage to Das Boot. No, no, no, I didn't hate the movie. I can't emphasize enough that it was perfectly fine as Hollywood submarine flicks go. See this if you want to, but I would be a bad reviewer if I didn't suggest you rent the widescreen, subtitled director's cut of Das Boot instead. (Avoid the pan-and-scan, dubbed director's cut or the old, butchered, dubbed version called The Boat.) It's a long movie, but so much more rewarding than this piece of eye candy.

—Steve

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