Review of The Limits of Control (2009) by Archibald T — 22 Mar 2011

As I descended into impassable rivers,I no longer felt guided by the ferrymen... - arthur rimbaudThe names of the characters are not important. You only know the main character as the Lone Man. That's all.

He's given a mission to kill a man who seems to be controlling some sort of artificial reality. Think about other films where a character who has to stop the villian and you'll understand. When the Lone Man meets his target, he kills him with a piece of guitar wire.

"Reality is arbitrary," the Lone Man tells him.Before all of this though he meets six characters who are all in part symbolize the bohemian way of thinking: Music, Movies, Sex, Science, Art and lastly Hallucinations.

He exchanges matchboxes with these people, reads a coded message and eats the message.Much of the film is existential, how everything relates to something even if it's different. For example, When the Lone Man visits an art gallery he sees a painting of a naked woman.

When he returns to his room a naked woman is laying on his bed. How ironic. I think when he's looking at a painting he's using his imagination. "Everything's imagined," one character tells him, the man who makes violins with only one string.

Trippy. There's also a hint of the characters being aware that there's people watching them. "Among us are those who are not among us," the molecules lady mentions. Is she talking about us, the audience? Or about those who are watching him from the helicopter? I only mention this because the film is shot like it didn't have a director.

This is a film that will test your patience. Ebert hated this film, but I think he knew what it was about:"That reminded me of a silent film named "Man with a Movie Camera," which some people think is the best film ever made.

It shows a man with a movie camera, photographing things. Was Jarmusch remaking it without the man and the camera?"The cinematography is beautiful and the soundtrack is excellent. Jarmusch has made better films and one of them for me anyways would be Broken Flowers.

The trailer for this film makes it look like a mystery. It is, but it's also headscratchingly unconventional that it must be seen for it's trance like tale of existential subjectivity.