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primer - a little known, mindblowing sci-fi movie

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Ranked #23,302 in Entertainment, #285,050 overall

The basics

Primer is a movie released in 2004 about a group of men who hold full time jobs as engineers at a large corporation, in their spare time try to develop a business manufacturing various technical apparatuses. They eventually develop a time travel device (by accident) and the majority of the movie is spent covering the consequences of using it.

The film is really unique in several different ways:

1. One man produced, financed, starred in, composed the music for and wrote the movie: Shane Carruth
2. The technical details and process that the main characters go through creating the machine are not watered down for a "normal" audience. It makes the movie highly enjoyable for anyone with an engineering background, or even just your average geek.
3. The timeline for the movie is incredibly obfuscated, making it difficult to comprehend the first time you see the movie.

By far, Primer is my favorite movie of all time because it is more like taking a peek deep down inside the mind of the man who made it. You can't help but feel a personal connection with Shane after viewing it. Additionally, it's not a passive form of entertainment, the movie engages your mind and forces you to think, very hard, about the events that are presented to you.

Reviews

(without any spoilers)

These reviews give an overview of the movie without spoiling any of the finer points.

Mike Riley's take on Primer: Pretty good writeup, if I do say so myself ;) I mostly wrote this with the idea in mind to convince people to see the movie, rather than explain it to them.

primer movie trailer

a little preview of what it is

The preview here hypes up the movie quite a bit, but for those of you who eschew traditional movie conventions, don't be afraid. The movie itself isn't nearly this cliched!

A movie that engages you and requires you to THINK

By far the greatest thing about this movie is the fact that it requires an analytical mind and a good bit of thinking in order to understand what happens. It's for people who like entertainment that requires you to WATCH it instead of just sitting back and casually observing it.

In depth timeline

WARNING THIS CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS ABOUT THE MOVIE

With the movie being a little difficult to understand, even after watching it a few times, I'm going to highlight some of the basics, and try to move on to clear up some of the more complicated issues.

The entire movie takes place over the course of a few days in March. The scenes are not displayed in true chronological order, but the order they are displayed in seems to tell a chronologically sound story, at first glance. The trick here is that when you are watching any given scene, it is from the appropriate date and time that would normally place it in order with the rest of the scenes in the movie, but that date and time is recorded from an instance of either before or after our characters have used the time machine. This is where the majority of confusion comes from when viewing the movie.

Scenes that are in this "alternate reality" are first introduced to the movie when Abe approaches Aaron in the park and gives him the "if you promise to do the few small things I ask..." line. From this point forward it is very important to pay close attention to small details, and try to string together some sense out of the chronology of the disarranged scenes.

I won't give away too much, but in order to give you a little direction when figuring out the movie, here are some key points:

a day in the box

"You got anything to eat? I haven't eaten anything since later this afternoon."

main points of confusion

where most people get lost when viewing the film

Names: Aaron is the main character, the one with a wife and child.
Throughout the movie, there are (by my approximation) 7 different timelines that occur simultaneously.
By the end of the movie you have encountered 4 different copies of Aaron and 3 different copies of Abe.
The incedent with Mr. Grangier is the one "grey area" in the movie, and by the writer's own admission, nobody really ever understands why it occurs.
The "failsafe" machine allows the characters to go back before any of the trouble started, Abe had the foresight to install it and turn it on before any of the rest of the machines.

How exactly does this time travel thing work?

The one nice thing about this overly complicated storyline is that the very basics of it are clearly explained, but a few permutations of these rules established by the explanation lead to very, very complicated situations.

Rules to Follow to Evade Causality Paradoxes or Generally Screwing Your Life Up:

This was scrawled on a piece of paper and shown for a brief moment in the movie. The astute observer of the film would have noticed that they were rules to follow while time traveling. The obsessed fan (me) would discover, through careful research, what they are.

Do not disturb the box after you exit it. You or your double is in it.
When re-experiencing time stay away from your double until he/she has started his/her journey backwards.
Worry about yourself first. Now is the only moment that has to make sense.
Don't be too curious about your surroundings.

an amazing production

on a microbudget

People generally went crazy for this thing when it came out, it's a hard sell to major film distributors because it lacks that blockbuster/Hollywood edge, but it sure is some damn fine film making. The entire movie was produced for $7000, and it still managed to claim the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance 2004. The movie really is incredible just from the production standpoint alone, not to mention the fact that it contains one of the most intriguing and thought provoking story lines that I've come across in any form of entertainment.

Interview with Shane Carruth

Rare glimpse into the man behind the making

There is so much mystery surrounding the whole movie, and it attracted a pretty decent following. Eventually it looks like someone caught up with the dude who created the whole movie and got this interview.

Buy Primer

You know you want to.

If you enjoy this movie, please support Shane and purchase it! Again, this whole thing was financed by him, and he really did a great job, I'm sure any purchases will be appreciated.

blogosphere on primer

see what the bloggers have to say about it

Generally reviews from independent bloggers about this movie were spectacular, with the exception of those people who just didn't understand the movie ;-)

I remember someone described it as a "futile exercise in obfuscation" or something like that, but I don't think it was futile at all. The difficulty people encounter absorbing this movie is why I love it.

The 'Looper' UK Poster is Slightly Ominous: The look reminds me very much of the key art for Primer, the wonderful time-travel film from director Shane Carruth. (Who also helped out on Looper.) And it's the sort of thing that a film nerd would be happy to look at each day as it hangs on the wall ...
Cannes 2012, Day 10: Cronenberg meets DeLillo, Matthew McConaughey's name is ...: There's no story to speak of, just a series of financial and philosophical conversations delivered at rapid-fire speed; at times I was reminded of Shane Carruth's brilliant low-budget sci-fi mindbender Primer, in which it's not important that you ...
Review: Not Saying a Lot, But 'Men in Black III' is Best of the Series: But you don't expect Shane Carruth-level structuring with something a Men in Black film. That's not what it's there for. It's primary goal is to have Smith acting all Will Smith-like, cool but naive and as full of himself as he's ever been.
10 Best Time Travel Movies of All Timelines: Some day, people from the distant future will travel back to our era and inform us that science has conclusively identified the best movies about time travel. Until then, though, we're forced to make our own judgements.

are you a primer fan? do you want to be?

let's hear what all of you have to say about it? questions? comments? concerns? I know someone has to have some!

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Luke Oct 8, 2009 @ 1:58 pm | delete

My favorite movie too--but one point: I don't care for the timeline thing. Autistics Anonymous should keep out of sci-fi movies. You are not supposed to know what is going on when it really gets into it--that is the whole point. The characters themselves don't know the whole 100% of anything, so why should you? It gives you an authentic experience. It also adds verisimilitude, as does the overlapping dialogue, hard to hear, etc. And it was all one-take... amazing. It's a real, real timeless classic.

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Aaron #4 Aug 9, 2009 @ 8:01 pm | delete

If you want an in-depth analysis of the film ( its ok, we are all lost ) try reading The Primer Universe book that I found at blogspot.com. Very detailed with a lot of things that noone else figured out.

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yelirekim Jul 6, 2009 @ 2:35 am | in reply to keelaay | delete

the first machine is created by abe before the park bench scene takes place, after he has created this machine (and a failsafe) he goes and gives the "if you promise to do the few small things i ask" speech to aaron, and they continue their days activities, culminating in the moment when aaron witnesses the still live copy of abe "return" to the machine and enter it

please don't hesitate to email me if you have other questions about the movie: mikeriley@yelirekim.com

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keelaay Jul 5, 2009 @ 9:47 pm | delete

PLEASE HELP! My problem remains my confusion with both Aarons and Abes apparently going back to a timeline before the first box (failsafe) was created. The scene that I cant get my arms around is when Aaron and Abe are testing their watches and figuring out the weebles in the garage after the first park bench seen. This is when they figure it out the thing is a time machine, right? But Aaron calculates numbers in his head way to quickly and is snapping his pliers impatiently apparently because he talking thru a conversation he has already heard. Then they walk out on the driveway and commit to building the box, right? But Abe has already gone back in the box once because this is after the park bench scene, right?? So how in the world could either Aaron or Abe travel back to a time prior to figuring out the concept of the machine with their watches and prior to when the decide to build a box?? It seems to me that the box has not been created yet so these must be first gen. Aarons and Abes. But it's after the park bench encounter%u2026 I know I must be missing something obvious. Please help!!

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Chris Sep 20, 2008 @ 12:47 pm | delete

This is definitely one of the most thought-provoking movies I have ever watched and would recommend seeing this film to anyone.