THE UNIVERSAL THEORY - Mark Reviews Movies

The Universal Theory, Oscilloscope Laboratories

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Review by Mark Dujsik | September 26, 2024

The concept of the multiverse is here to stay—for the time being, at least. In case further proof is needed, here's an independent, arty feature from Europe—specifically Germany, Austria, and Switzerland—that revolves around a doctoral student in quantum physics who stumbles upon the notion of the existence of multiple planes of reality. In The Universal Theory, he gradually finds evidence that his hypothesis might be true.

Well, that's the basic gist of co-writer/director Timm Kröger's movie, which folds in on itself so often that its story, characters, and ultimate purpose become thin to the point of almost being non-existent. It comes across as being strange and impenetrable simply to be those qualities.

On the positive side, the movie, lensed primarily in black-and-white by cinematographer Roland Stuprich, looks fantastic. The bulk of the increasingly incomprehensible plot is set in the 1960s at and around a ski resort in the Swiss Alps. It's basically a film noir, featuring a mystery, a potential femme fatale, pursuing men in fedoras and overcoats, and people dying violent deaths before they can give key information to our hapless protagonist. Sometimes, they might die more than once, which must be especially irritating for our confounded man.

He's Johannes Leinert (Jan Bülow), the grandson of a wealthy industry magnate who wants to make his own way and choices in life. Johannes is currently working on his doctoral thesis under the guidance of Dr. Strathen (Hanns Zischler), who thinks the thing is bunk and not well-written, but his student is the grandson of a rich tycoon, after all. The two take a train to Switzerland for a conference, which is delayed because the keynote speaker has had some traveling issues, but since they're already there, Strathen decides the pair should stay on another week.

As for the plot, it certainly exists, although to determine what it actually entails would require either a detailed chart of characters, connections, motives, and timelines or blind faith that Kröger and co-screenwriter Roderick Warich know what they're doing. There is, at least, a broad explanation of how these enigmatic things occur by the end of the story, but even if one trusts that the filmmakers do know what happens when and how, it's difficult to figure out if they bothered with a why in terms of those events.

At first, Johannes and his advisor do a lot of waiting at the resort. They encounter characters such as Prof. Blumberg (Gottfried Breitfuss), a reformed Nazi who seems enthused by and supportive of the student's theory, and a young bellhop (played by Emanuel Waldburg-Zeil), who does a Nazi salute because his grandfather owns the hotel and the kid believes he can get away with anything. The boy and his friend (played by Vivienne Bayley) might be the cause of everything that happens or just happen upon some part of it, when they explore an old cave in the mountains, resulting in the friend being hospitalized.

The most important other figure is the mysterious Karin (Olivia Ross), a pianist at the resort, whom Johannes meets at a nearby church while sheltering from a storm. When he spots her in the banquet room, she either plays coy about knowing him or genuinely has never met him. Johannes assumes the first possibility, especially since Karin somehow seems to know things about his past and, as unlikely as it may be, his future. The two have a brief affair, which Karin seems to abandon when she gets an important detail about Johannes' past wrong.

Look, it all does make a certain kind of sense, once one realizes where/when Karin is from and who/what she is—or, maybe more accurately, could be, depending on where/when she is at this moment in time (or, even more accurately, in which time she is at the moment). The problem is that the screenplay is so focused on the broad concept of ideas, while Kröger is so concentrated on the general exercise of the mood of the piece, that plot itself, which does become the driving force of the narrative here, seems a minor priority for the filmmakers. It's like watching someone assemble a puzzle in a darkened room while wearing a blindfold, being assured that, yes, all of the pieces are exactly where they need to be.

We'll trust that the mechanics of The Universal Theory are sound. Witnessing them unfold without any stake in caring about the process, though, is neither entertaining nor compelling.

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