Primer (2004 Film) - Thoughts?

Last year, I purchased literally a few hundred DVDs at a Blockbuster as they went out of business, down to when they reach a buck or two each. Randomly, I threw one on last night, "Primer" from 2004.

Apologies if there is already an old thread on this one (can't find one), but does anyone have any thoughts on this one? As many have described, it kind of exploded my brain trying to figure it out, and there are a ton of breakdowns on line trying to decipher and map the thing out.

It's certainly about as realistic (visually and tone-wise) as a time travel movie seems like it could be. I'm not sure how successful it is as a film, but it got me thinking a lot, so I think that's good!

 

Pretty good cult movie.

 

I loved it. And shot on a ridiculous budget of (I think) $6000. It's one of those movies where as I was watching it, I had zero idea of what was actually happening, but I was so caught up in the look and feel and tone of it that I didn't mind!

David Lynch stuff is like that for me as well. Where some people feel the need to intricately analyze everything and "figure it all out", I'm happy to just enjoy the ride.

There's a recent film just out on DVD called "Pig" that's described as a cross between "Primer" and "Memento" - a pretty apt description, and it's good as well. For more weird time loop stuff try "Time Crimes" and "Triangle"

 

I watched it for the first time only the other week - I need to watch it again! There's also some interesting essays on the web which I will read when I get the chance - a huge amount of thought went into this movie.

If you liked it, check out the director's follow-up from last year 'Upstream Color'. Fairly impenetrable plot-wise but still rather extraordinary.

 

I saw it in the theater, have the DVD, watched it several times, and I'm still not sure I totally get it. It's a fascinating movie, and I like how writer/director Shane Carruth didn't try do dumb it down or pull out the impenetrable jargon though, that all gives it more of a sense of realism to me. I also like his character's reaction when he realises something extraordinary is going on: "we can publish!"

Also: when I see a fine, watchable movie like this - or Robert Rodriguez's El Mariachi - and know that it only cost about 10 grand or so, it just underlines how there's no excuse for Hollywood films that aren't blockbuster action movies to cost over $50 million.

 

It's the only movie I know of that requires diagrams (like this one and this one) in order to understand just what the smeg is going on.

 

I've considered seeing the new one. The thing is, I definitely like the sci-fi time travel mind-exploding aspects of "Primer", but the director has said in interviews he doesn't feel that's the main point. I can't disagree, but it's certainly what makes it more interesting and not just a tedious, incomprehensible indie movie where nothing happens. So, looking at "Upstream Color", I'm concerned it's all the style of "Primer" without the sci-fi elements.

One review made some allusion to "Upstream Color" making Terence Malick movies seem fast-paced.

 

I seem to be in the minority on this, but to me that's a sign of a bad film, not a good one. I watched Primer and didn't understand the hype around it. It's hopelessly complex, big deal.

 

The first hour is riveting in Primer. The ending is a bit messy, if I recall correctly.

 

I saw Primer years ago when it was first released on DVD and enjoyed it. I didn't think it was all that difficult to understand. My belief system was certainly stretched, but I think I grasped most of what was happening. I definitely comprehended enough to think, "Woah, this is trippy!"

I liked Upstream Color too. Slower moving than Primer, but still interesting.

 

I was expecting to like the storyline or at least characters of Primer far more than I actually did, but that's probably because my IQ isn't up to making neat sense of the various overlapping timelines and resulting paradoxes about who's which version of who. But maybe that's one of the points - that when you mess with time you end up with mess.

Along similar but simpler lines, as films to sit back and enjoy I prefer Time Crimes or Deja Vu. But for a "realistic" portrayal of what might come of repeated time travel trips Primer sets the benchmark. And when you consider the budget, Primer's a fantastic achievement by any standards.

 

I liked it. I think I got enough of it to enjoy it, but certainly not the full timeline. I can't believe someone was able to graph it all out.
It's supposed to be one of the very few time travel movies that gets the timeline stuff correct.

 

I worked on El Mariachi, and note that none of the sound Rodriguez recorded could be used due to sync problems, so everything had to be completely looped and re-recorded from scratch. The union mix at Sony Pictures cost $250,000, and the color-correction I did on the film took about a week and cost $15,000. So it's a misnomer to believe that El Mariachi only cost a few thousand dollars to make. (Robert has said different numbers at different times, but I believe in his book Rebel Without a Crew he said $6500.)

There are very good reasons why movies cost what they cost, and there are certain fixed expenses you can't get around. I agree that movies with budgets over $100M can quickly spiral out of control, but anybody who doesn't understand why movies cost what they cost has little or no understanding of the filmmaking process. 90% of it boils down to the high cost of actors, writers, directors, and producers, and it's not the below--the-line physical production costs (the hundreds of technicians who work on the film).

http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/movie-cost.htm
http://www.denofgeek.com/movies/17187/why-are-films-getting-so-much-more-expensive-to-make

There's some interesting reviews of Primer out there:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primer_(film)

 

I thought it was really neat for a $7000 film. Gee I wish more films could be half this creative.

 

Haven't seen Primer, but I saw Upstream Color and thought it was a bunch of pretentious nonsense. All style, absolutely zero substance. It looked like the director had a background in artsy commercials and shot the entire film that way. After about half an hour I started doing fast forward theatre with it, jumping ahead in hopes of something, anything, happening -- and nothing ever did. Ultimately, Carruth seems to think the film's reason for being is the puzzle structure, rather than telling an interesting story. Once you do figure out what's going on, it isn't very compelling. A classic case of "I have to script, so I'll try to distract you with fancy visuals."

 

I agree. We watched three quarters of it and found intensely uninteresting. A puzzle film is fine if it has an interesting narrative that is developed. The latter just didn't happen and showed his lack of experience as a writer/director.

 

I really loved Primer; I enjoyed the challenge of trying to keep up the intelligent brainteasing/twisting/logical possibilities of what had happened. It's pretty short (under 70 minutes? I forget) and on first viewing I watched it 4 times back to back to back etc, including once with the director's commentary.

Then I spent about a week reading/discussing it on the 'net at places like IMDB. Don't think I could begin to explain it correctly now after so many years, but that is what is so cool about it, it exercises your mind.

If you like twisty "my brain hurts trying to figure it out time travel" movies you might want to check out Timecrimes. Like Primer it is a low budget indie type film (in Spanish) where the story is what is impt, not the budget/effects. At the core is a similar dilemma with time travel - what happens to the multiple "you"s as "you" go back in time and affect your "future" selves etc.

 

Timecrimes is great and I think it may still be streaming on Netflix.

 

Oh, man, there's a ton of movies like that out there. I'm getting really, really sick of the intense, over-the-top color they throw at a lot of action movies these days. Have you seen the look they gave the new Transformers? Good god, it's just puke-city. I have no idea why directors are pushing so hard for style over substance in features. I have no problem with this idea in music videos, shorts, or commercials, because you're trying to grab the audience's attention in a few seconds. For a movie, it totally sucks.

 

I was told that due to their budget, they had a "two take" rule for every scene.

 

Here's another chart http://xkcd.com/657/

 

That’s what I’ve been afraid “Upstream Color” would be like. After having seen “Primer” and found it quite interesting, it didn’t take long listening to some of the director’s commentary and reading a few interviews that I probably wasn’t going to be a fan so much of the director. Rather, he just happened to make a film with a premise and execution I found interesting. As soon as I saw an interview where he seemed to indicate he felt the sci-fi/time travel/geek/nerd culture of making flow charts and whatnot was missing the actual “point” of the movie, I figured any subsequent movie he would make on other topics would probably not grab my interest.

 

I thought Upstream Color was great, but it's true - Shane Carruth isn't very interested in narrative. If you are open to non-narrative cinema you may well like it. Otherwise - avoid.

 

Doh! - I had no idea this "Upstream Color" movie mentioned earlier was by the same director (until the most recent posts). I will have to check it out.

 

Time travel is very confusing!