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Of Unknown Origin
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“The
problem is, you spend ten per cent of your time thinking about this rat, but he
spends one-hundred per cent of his time figuring out how to outsmart you.”
That
is the simple but chilling premise which propels this intriguing, barely-known
Canadian horror-thriller about a stressed businessman, Bart (Peter Weller), who
becomes utterly obsessed with the wily little rodent that inhabits his
carefully self-renovated home.
The
rat is no supernatural monster – and Bart is no hero. Director George Pan
Cosmatos [1941-2005, maker of several Sylvester Stallone action movies, and father
of Panos Cosmatos of Mandy (2018)
fame] reduces them both to their most basic, instinctual level as they stalk
each other around a progressively demolished domestic space.
Little
by little – as Bart becomes a twitching wreck, ludicrously swinging a baseball
bat at anything that moves – we are shown the fantastic network of holes and
passageways that this resourceful rat has eaten away for himself.
High
art is full of tales of relentless obsession, descent into madness, and strange
conflicts between humans and inhuman beings or even inanimate but pesky objects
– think of Roman Polanski’s Repulsion (1965), or Elias Canetti’s extraordinary
1935 novel Auto-da-Fé (which,
incredibly, has never been filmed). They tend to be thick with semantic
suggestiveness and the trappings of allegory.
The
fascination of Cosmatos’ B movie, however, lies in the way it strips the story
of any meaningfulness or symbolism whatsoever, remaining doggedly literal from
start to finish.
That
makes it a queerly compelling, intensely physical film.
© Adrian Martin October 1990 |