Beyond the Multiplex

"The Nines": Hard bodies, shifting identities and reality TV as a metaphor for whatever

There ought to be rules about the kinds of solutions you can supply in "puzzle pictures" -- you know, those delicious, deliberately disorienting, what-the-hell movies, like "Memento" or "The Usual Suspects" or the entire oo-ver of M. Night Shyamalan. Unfortunately, I can't discuss what I think those rules might be without giving away the secret behind John August's "The Nines," an intriguing, episodic film that starts out genuinely creepy and funny and ends up like an overblown "Twilight Zone" episode.

Hell, at least it's a good "Twilight Zone" episode. August's directing debut -- he's a veteran screenwriter who's penned several films for Tim Burton, including "Big Fish," "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and "Corpse Bride" -- occasioned a certain amount of yammer at Sundance last winter, but I honestly can't see much here to discuss. By all means see the film; it's an ingenious, interlocking construction worthy of Agatha Christie, with tour-de-force performances from Hope Davis, Ryan Reynolds and Melissa McCarthy and a clever backstage-Hollywood premise (several minor movie-biz personalities play themselves). But David Lynch this ain't; you'll go to bed with all your questions answered, and answered with a kind of moon-faced, altar-boy earnestness.

"The Nines" alludes to philosophical or metaphysical profundity without possessing any, which is certainly a successful pop-entertainment mode (Shyamalan, q.v.). In its first and most enjoyable segment, "The Prisoner" -- August is indeed alluding to the legendary 1960s British TV mind-boggle -- Reynolds plays Gary, the hunky star of a TV crime-fighting series who's gone on a crack-and-hookers binge and is now under house arrest. It's somebody else's house, and Gary keeps seeing and hearing things that aren't there, and becomes increasingly surrounded with eerie occurrences of the numeral 9. (He finds a Post-it on the kitchen counter, in his own handwriting, that he can't remember making: "Look for THE NINES.") Gary's under the whip of a plump and plucky P.R. handler, played by McCarthy with delicious enthusiasm, and she seems straightforward enough. But even dim Gary sees that something is up with Sarah (Davis), the desperate housewife next door who seems awfully eager to swap cups of sugar, but always flees before consummation.

There's terrific skill and spookiness to this segment, which blends the sleek look of a "Melrose Place" episode with a slowly building undercurrent of madness. All three actors reappear in the film's next two segments, as the mystery of Gary's ghosts and his semi-amnesiac state begins, however unfortunately, to unravel. In the second section, "Reality Television," Reynolds becomes Gavin, the owner of the house inhabited by Gary. Gavin is a gay TV show-runner and Type A workaholic, who's himself the subject of a behind-the-scenes reality show, because his new series "Knowing" is on the fast track toward a prime-time slot. Davis plays Susan, the slithery, faux-sincere executive who forces Gavin to fire his oldest friend (McCarthy, playing, er, the actress Melissa McCarthy) from a starring role -- and then gives him some even more surprising news.

August's final section takes place inside "Knowing," in which Reynolds plays an earnest, bearded dad, and McCarthy plays the wife he leaves behind with their daughter and stranded car, in the pilot episode, while he hikes back out of the wilderness to get help. On the road he meets Sierra (Davis), who is a little hippy-dippy and subtly seductive, and what the hell is she doing out there in the Southern California mountains without a car, anyway? By this time we've kind of figured out the secret of Gary/Gavin's identity, and it breaks those rules I can't talk about and makes "The Nines" a lot less interesting than it seems at first. The movie never fails to be crisply written and cannily delivered, but it's way too steeped in TV-culture inside jokes for its own good, and August's attempts to suffuse the whole thing with ontological or theological meaning are ultimately pretty dumb.

"The Nines" opens Aug. 31 at the Sunshine Cinema in New York and the Nuart Theatre in Los Angeles, with more cities to follow.

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