Full of graphic sex, themes of mortality and the origin of life, and inexplicable ballet and poetry vignettes, 3 is everything you want your artsy foreign films to be… except entertaining. While director Tom Tykwer’s most acclaimed film, Run Lola Run, was exceptionally fast paced, he finds his balance with 3, which is exceptionally slow. A tedious watch, 3 fails to bring either the excitement of Run Lola Run or the character development of his more recent films like The Princess and The Warrior and Heaven.

Perhaps the tedium of the film is an intentional reflection of the tedium of the long-term relationship between main characters Simon (Sebastian Schipper) and Hanna (Sophie Rois), both of whom have ambiguous jobs of a creative nature. Hanna, a doctor of some sort, seems to be the host of a television talk show who moonlights on an ethics committee that determines funding for scientific research. I couldn’t help but chuckle when Simon is asked what it is that he does and he replies that he’s an “art engineer,” and after a pause is asked, “What does that mean?” I’m not sure if the film was being self-aware at this point or if this bit of dialog was included to explain what it is that the characters do, but even with the explanation and the many scenes showing the characters at work, I still have no idea what it is either of them does for a living. I only know that they are very self-important and artistic.

The film is full of heavy-handed symbolism, apparent even in the characters’ names. The three main characters all have biblical names. Simon, a healer in the Bible, ironically has cancer. Likewise, Hanna, a notoriously infertile biblical character, becomes pregnant. Then there’s Adam, the first man. The film’s Adam (Devid Striesow) is a sexually promiscuous, motorcycle-riding, choir-singing, soccer-playing fertility specialist scientist researching stem cells and chimera, the scientific term for a single organism that is comprised of tissues from multiple organisms. Adam is also a father, a karate master and a sailor. All that and he still finds time to pick up guys at the gym! An obvious symbol for transformation and new life, Adam brings passion back into the lives of the couple when he independently meets and becomes intimately involved with each of them.

The film is visually interesting, incorporating several editing techniques including a notable Brian De Palma-esque collage of panels that gives us a sampling of the lives of the characters at the beginning of the film and again during the development of their relationships. There’s also a heavily symbolic cross-cutting montage that juxtaposes the removal of Simon’s testicle with Hanna’s initial infidelity. Yes, Simon has testicular cancer, which is only one of the two cancer-related storylines, which is one too many for a movie not about cancer. This allows for one of the most bizarre and offensive aspects of the storyline, where a straight male character suddenly becomes interested in men after being castrated.

The film gets better as it goes along, but watching it is laborious and not just because of the subtitles that move too fast during the rapid bursts of conversation and the overlapping dialog. In whole, the film is not without value, addressing the midlife crisis phenomenon with a unique angle, very relatable to aging hipsters who have failed to find meaning in their artsy careers and non-traditional relationships; who have ended up, despite all efforts to the contrary, in the same type of boring monotonous lifestyles as their parents. Life is a cycle, as this film demonstrates, and there are inevitable phases. The characters in this film find a sort of contentment not by fighting the cycle, but ultimately by surrendering to it, although in an unexpected and non-traditional way.

3. Directed by Tom Tykwer. Starring  Sebastian Schipper, Sophie Rois and Devid Striesow. Not rated.  www.strandreleasing.com.

Review by Jennifer Waller Sibley