THE STEAM EXPERIMENT (THE CHAOS EXPERIMENT)

US, 2009, 90 minutes, Colour.
Val Kilmer, Armand Assante, Eric Roberts, Megan Brown, Patrick Muldoon, Cordelia Reynolds, Eve Mauro, Quinn Duffy.
Directed by Philippe Martinez.

The Steam Experiment did not receive wide release. Comments were very critical.

However, the basic premise has some interest, similar to films about experiments and psychological testing in the US and in the German film of 2001, Das Experiment.

The difficulty is that the audience does not know what actually happened. In a linear direction, it shows a scientist, Jimmy, going into an editorial office and demanding that his story be put on the front page to alert people to global warming. However, the editor invites a detective in who interrogates Jimmy. It appears that he is actually from a mental institution and the interrogation continues, the detective not sure whether the story he is telling happened in the past, is happening now, or happened in Jimmy’s mind. The detective is played by Armand Assante and Val Kilmer is Jimmy.

The film also shows Jimmy organising an abandoned hotel as a centre for a dating agency, explaining it to one of his victims, played by Eric Roberts.

The film shows six people, responding to the invitation to the dating agency, to go into a steam room. They are locked in, the steam becomes hotter and hotter, the six characters behave in different ways, aggressive, suicidal, going insane. In the meantime, Jimmy is recounting the story to the detective as if it happened and he was observant.

By the end, the audience is not sure whether all this really happened or happened inside Jimmy’s head. This is complicated by the fact that the doctor and nurse at the institution, seen at the end, were also among the six. Did this mean that they agreed to be part of the experiment, engineered the experiment, or Jimmy simply used them because he knew them from the institution.

The film at times is rather hysterical, strong music, people sweating and screaming, with some brutality. In the meantime, Jimmy spends a lot of time staring madly into space. The film was directed by theatre director from Marseilles, Philippe Martinez, who went to the United States and produced and directed some straight-to-video material.

1. The impact of the film? The idea behind the film? The execution?

2. The title, the psychological experiment, scientific experiment? Brutality and sadism?

3. The American city, the newspaper editorial rooms, the mental institution, the interrogation rooms? The dark and sinister aspects? The contrast with the hotel, in decay? The steam room? The corridors outside?

4. Jimmy, his intensity, going into the editorial office, persuading the security to let him in, the discussion with the editor, showing him his story, the editor calling the detective, Jimmy’s disappointment? Going with the detective, sitting in the interrogation room? His explanations of what was going on? The madness in the descriptions? The final revelation about Jimmy in the institution, his having been there for months, seeing him alone at the end?

5. The editor and his decision to call in the detective? The detective, his having a night off, responding to the call? His interrogations, the puzzle, not sure? Leaving Jimmy at the end?

6. The six people, Grant and the discussions with Jimmy in the hotel? The agreement and contract to go into the steam room? Ordinary? The heat, discovering the room was locked? The attempts to open the door, banging on the door? The breaking of the window with the crack? The woman and her head outside – and the attack on her, her death? The personalities, the difference between the men, the differences between the women? The women and their being there, waitress, the opportunity, would-be actress, the nurse? Their interactions, hysteria, the woman and her anger with the man, his brutality towards her, her cutting her own throat? The two women banding together for support? Grant, quiet, his becoming violent, trying to get out? The restaurateur, his vanity, in the briefs, his death? The doctor, his not being identified as the doctor, Grant being suspicious of him – later with reason? The nature of the experiment?

7. Jimmy’s motivation, global warming and this being a demonstration of the dangers?

8. The finale, the doctor and the nurse, their discussions with Jimmy – and their role in the experiment? Organising it or not? Participating and observing or not? Or figments of Jimmy’s fantasy?

9. The overall effect of this kind of film – as melodrama, as social warning?