Carruth primed for sci-fi stardom

Primer, the debut film of 32-year-old Shane Carruth, has ignited a massive debate on Internet message boards over what exactly happens in this maddening, provocative movie. At its core, Primer is the story of a relationship, tested by temptation and eventually deception. But this film has a few twists: the relationship is a friendship between two whiz-kid engineers, the temptation has to do with inter-time meddling and the deception… well, that’s where things get confusing. Although this plot complexity is what’s making Primer famous in cyberspace, Carruth said he “was much more interested in what’s happening with the film thematically.”

Perhaps this theme-centered approach is why Carruth is being hailed as a sci-fi artist in the same league as Stanley Kubrick. What Kubrick understood, and what up-and-comer Carruth seems to grasp, is that while tech-speak and gizmos are fun extras, great sci-fi serves as a metaphor for the triumphs and failings of society. “There is something that’s universal,” Carruth said. “You take any relationship… and you introduce this power… and that is the thing that breaks the trust.”

So whether the power in question is a weapon, a secret or an ability to change the past, the resulting psychological and moral dilemmas are much the same. Carruth insists that the audience should be able to extract meaning from the film despite the complexities inherent to sci-fi. While it may take a few viewings to master Primer’s fragmented timeline, Carruth said he hopes that the film will still have an impact the first time around.

Those audiences that are up for the challenge of untangling the plot should take comfort in Carruth’s assertion that Primer contains all the necessary information, even though the film’s frequent cross-cutting might make it seem like important pieces got left on the cutting room floor. The film’s minuscule $7,000 budget made it unaffordable to film anything that wouldn’t make it to the final version. As a result, Carruth had to plan carefully, meticulously designing scenes down to the placement of the tiniest prop. Everything appearing in the final film, then, has been a part of Carruth’s vision through the entire process: an unusual approach that has perhaps more to do with philosophy than finances. “I tried my best to make a film that I would want to see,” Carruth said. “I want to know everything is happening for a reason… that it’s not just a random assemblage of plot points that somebody thought was cool.”

Carruth admits he’s confounded, however, by famous movies such as In the Mood for Love, in which editing affected the plot of the finished film more than the original screenwriting. “To know that [the final product] was so different than the original vision,” Carruth lamented. “I want there to be subtext, and architecture.”

This elucidation of the finer points of filmmaking comes from a guy who was working as a software designer until recently, when he was bitten by the movie-making bug. The self-taught Carruth got his first taste of fame when Primer took the Grand Jury prize at the Sundance Film Festival, over audience favorite Garden State. “I don’t know if I expected [Primer] to actually be seen by so many people,” Carruth said in reference to the Internet maelstorm that has followed the film’s opening. Much like the mysterious time-travel device serves as a first lesson in ethics for Primer’s inexperienced protagonists, so is the brilliant but admittedly naïve Carruth about to get plunged into a world rife with complications: Hollywood.

Primer opens at The Carolina Theatre this Friday, Oct. 29.