MULTIPLE SARCASMS: Life in the crapper

In this (Too Much) Information Age, we may have access to tons of data, but take little time for self-reflection. Without the latter, the former doesn’t matter.

MULTIPLE SARCASMS reminds that the unexamined life is not worth living, but its protagonist makes the case that the examiners may not be worth living… with. Playing a fitfully charming, charmlessly fitful architect, Timothy Hutton, escapes his family and career inertia by immersing himself in playwriting. He locks himself in his bathroom to do so, an appropriate venue for most aspiring artistes. Odds and talent be damned, on screen, this novice succeeds, supported by an agent (the apparently age-less Stockard Channing) and tolerated by his wife (the lovely Dana Delany) and precocious daughter (the precocious India Ennenga), despite the fact Broadway’s rising star identifies himself as the center of any and every solar system. Of course, the distance between his skewed perspective and others’ reality may be many, many light years.

It is tempting to applaud the lead’s efforts to express himself, but at what cost? In a conversation with writer-director Brooks Branch, he assures me that all the characters benefit from Hutton’s egocentrism, though I’m not sure I buy familial estrangement and abandonment as “ones to grow on.” Are we meant to evolve individually regardless of the consequences suffered by others? Is there no room for compassion and maturity in self-actualization? Yes, we must seek our true selves, but can’t those closest to us join the quest?

Auteur Branch crafts MULTIPLE SARCASMS as a retro tribute to the works of Bob Rafaelson and Hal Ashby. The script rambles, the players amble thru its non-traditional narrative. It’s like a cinematic spin on a Choose Your Own Adventure book; in fact, one may sense a second viewing would alter the outcome. The production team does yeoman work recreating New York in the 1970s, though the film features three other anachronisms, the most jarring, a reference to a Ryan O’Neal movie that was released in the 80s. The cast is time-sensitive, too: Delany is sharp, though sparingly seen, Hutton is solid, if unsympathetic and the standout is Mario Van Peebles who steels his scene with an iron-clad commitment to playing gay… well, straight. (He also provides a hilarious capper to the end credits, which are already a delight due to the graphic montage that picks up where the film’s limited interstitials left off,  visual clues to one character’s own artistic future.) Only Mira Sorvino fails to synchronize her calendar, playing Hutton’s indefatigable friend as if auditioning for a hopeless NBC sitcom in the 90s, a spinoff of Caroline in the City, perhaps.

MULTIPLE SARCASMS — now open in Seattle at the Regal Meridian 16 and the AMC Loews Oak Tree 6 — explores the intersection of artistry and self-identity, promising profundity from self-reflection rather than the loveless damnation of Narcissus. Even though Branch assures Hope abounds in his movie, I strongly suggest Hutton — and the rest of us — question how much time we spend self-absorbed for, at some point, we may long for more than our own image and listen to that distant voice. Might that Echo actually be our soul mate?