The 9th Configuration (1980)

[lester1/2jr]

        This is part of a trilogy of films by a guy named William Blatty.  You might have heard of one of the others:  the Exorcist.  Unless you are hard core you probably haven't heard of the other two, this being one of them.  It is not remotely as accesible as The Exorcist but it is of similar quality.   Blatty actually directed this one himself, which is good as it is practicly a miracle that it worked.   it's  a very demented hugley ambitous idea for a movie  and I doubt else could have done it.

                          The plot isn't exactly original:  The psychiatrist comes to the mental hospital, but is HE really a patient?  As one of the patients notes, this is the plot of  hitcock's "Spellbound".  So what's the point?  Well, the first hour of the movie is a (literally) insane comedy of mental patients and their lives at the facility, a huge castle for some reason.  One of them is putting on a production of Shakespears "Julias Caeser"  starring dogs.  One the other patients tries out for the play dressed as superman.  When the "producer" complains  this doesn't make sense Superman goes "it does the way I explained it".  The newly arrived pyschiatrist (or is he?)  is told that the world is full of "green soaked caterpillar torturers" and that god is a foot and can he explain "does foot exist?". 

                       Had it continued like this , it would have been a 4 star cinephile oddity, but it does turn into something deeper and takes a dramatic rather than comic turn.  All in all, it's not the popular/ critical home run that the exorcist was, but it deserves much more recognition and I would definately watch it again.

[trekgeezer]

This is one of those films that takes multiple viewings in order to understand what's happened. It is one of those rared oddities that morphs greatly from what you think it's starting out as.

Stacy Keach and the rest of the cast are great in this movie. Makes you wonder why his career took the dive that it did.


Col. Vincent Kane: In order for life to have appeared spontaneously on earth, there first had to be hundreds of millions of protein molecules of the ninth configuration. But given the size of the planet Earth, do you know how long it would have taken for just one of these protein molecules to appear entirely by chance? Roughly ten to the two hundred and forty-third power billions of years. And I find that far, far more fantastic than simply believing in God.

[soylentgreen]

A gem, Lester.  An absolute gem.

I first saw this as a bootleg vhs tape in the late 80s under it's even less marketable title, TWINKLE TWINKLE KILLER KANE.  Like SORCERER and a few others from around the same time, it was one of those 'You've GOT to track this one down' people had been murmuring about.

Keach is fantastic in a performance so subtle he's practically sleeping.  The off-the-wall characters played by Scott Wilson and Jason Miller are incredible.  It's really Ed Flanders who takes the cake for me.  I've always adored his sense of comic timing and his delivery in this(as well as Blatty's EXORCIST III) is a treat.  It's also great to peek at Tom Atkins and perpertually sullen-looking Neville Brand in their little roles.




***SPOILER***
The scene(actually lengthy sequence!)in the bar is a tour-de-force in uncomfortability.  The tension ratchets up so slow and purposefully, you're almost gasping for breath by the stunning climax of it.  The only other movie I can think of with such a deft instance of unrelenting tension is the too-much-unseen THE INCIDENT.  It's also a perverse thrill to see Richard Lynch earning his sleazy movie villain stripes here.

Much of what makes THE NINTH CONFIGURATION work so well is in evidence in EXORCIST III(which should have just been called LEGION)...the lulling pace, the somber use of location and a cast of quirky and ultra-talented actors.

Not a party film by any means, but a vital one for folks who want to see a little more about the human condition at work in their films. 

[Mr_Vindictive]

I used to have a VHS copy of this film.  Absolutely fantastic.  I'm not sure if I still have a copy.  I'll need to see about picking up the DVD.

I still prefer Blatty's Exorcist III over his other films and over the original Exorcist.  It's a haunting, surreal and damn frightening film.  Blatty has a certain skill at making nightmarish films.

[lester1/2jr]

skaboi- the DVD transfer wasn't anything to write home about.  I'm not an expert on such things but while the DVD is the directors definitive version it didn't look  as good as it probably could have imho  though it did havea nice little featurette

soylent-  that was a masterful scene.  when he walks into the bar your like "oh crap...killer kane!!"