Trampled under foot

 

Full disclosure, I am a huge fan of Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead. The only American film-maker that I think even comes close to their ingenuity and vision is Shane Carruth. Regretfully, Carruth hasn't made anything since is truly amazing Upstream Color.

So, we members of the Benson and Moorhead Marching and Shouting Society (to quote the late Vin Scully) must be content to watch their phenomenal, mind-bending films. I had actually thought that The Endless was the best film they would ever make, especially as it was followed by the middling Synchronic, which apparently showed what happens when promising film-makers meet the Hollywood System. Not good.

We had nothing to be concerned about, because Something in the Dirt is, well Something. Really something. I spent the first ten to fifteen minutes very confused about what was going on, and worrying -- it turns out, without reason -- that this was going to be a low budget Synchronic. It is not.

What Something in the Dirt is, is phenomenal. Mind-bending. Hallucinatory. Visionary. Funny has heck. All of these qualities rolled into a 115 minute tour-de-force that questions the very nature of Time and Space, Existence, Spirituality, and much, much more.

The basic plot is that a Man moves into an apartment in LA, and meets his neighbor who lives downstairs. Both characters are, as in The Endless, played by the co-directors, which, I think, is really where they are at their best. Unlike The Endless, this film concerns primarily the two Men, as they puzzle through cosmic phenomena that start occurring in the first Man's upstairs apartment.

I think I remember a scene in Ghostbusters where Bill Murray opens a closet door and it turns out to be the entrance to Hell or something. Think that, but on Acid. In this case, they open the closet door of the apartment and it appears to be a Time-Space vortex where matter and energy either do not exist, or exist to such excess that they erase everything else. Oh, and there are strange calculations written on the walls of the closet. But written by whom?

Benson and Moorhead are truly an acquired taste. But not, like some directors because they test the boundaries of "good taste" (I'm looking at you, Julia Dorcaneau). Mainly because you must be willing to take a cinematic acid trip - open to the idea that, in a film, the very nature of reality and existence can be essayed in celluloid. Or Digital, Whatever.

And some of the most interesting Indie SciFi films in recent memory are made in Los Angeles, set in LA and made by LA-based film-makers. The other one that comes to mind is the wonderful Under the Silver Lake, with Andrew Garfield. In any case, if you like your mind fully messed with, you will love Something in the Dirt. If you would rather that the story make traditional "sense", this is definitely not for you.

I loved it, though :)