World on a Wire

Germany

Second Sight Films

R2

German with English subtitles

Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s dark story of a computer-generated world introduces a theme that is still being exploited today in films like The Matrix. The concept of a computer-simulaton world is now a reality and is widely used in video games, but a quarter of a century ago when computers were new and the future was uncertain Fassbinder’s film seemed prophetic – and frightening.

Fred Stiller is a leading programmer with a company that has built Simulacron, what we would now call a virtual-reality program. It is populated by about 10,000 “identity units” who go about their lives inside the program. As a microcosm of German society they can be used to explore and predict future trends like public transport needs and housing. Siskins, the owner of the company, has a more sinister but profitable agenda. If he can program in industrial trends like steel production the steel company will have a tremendous advantage over its competitors – it will know what sort of market it will be facing in twenty years’ time.

Senior programmers in the company discover what Siskins is doing. It is against the Government controls, but before they can alert anyone they mysteriously disappear, sometimes while in plain view. They just seem to blink out of existence. All memories of them then seem to be lost. It’s like they were never a part of the real world. Fred knows of two such disappearances but is unable to prove anything since there is simply no evidence they ever existed. There is more, though. They seem to have become aware of something going on inside the program. This knowledge can lead to their disappearance. His suspicion grows that the “real” world itself is behaving like a huge computer simulation and they are all just players in it. Or is he going mad? Who can help him? Who can he trust?

In the simulation there is an identity unit they have named Einstein. He is the interface between the simulated world and the real world. They can briefly visit the simulated world and talk to Einstein to resolve problems. Einstein himself is having problems – he is becoming aware that he is a computer simulation and wants to move “up” to the real world. If, as Fred is coming to suspect, the real world is itself a simulation then there should be an Einstein equivalent somewhere close. Fred determines to find. If it exists this will prove to him that he is not really really mad. He is aware that if he finds himself part of a simulation, though, it may tip him over the edge into madness anyway. What would you do if you find you have been programmed to believe that you are self-aware?

Fassbinder’s film was played on German TV in two parts in 1973 then seemed to drop into obscurity – known about but rarely seen. This DVD version has been cleaned up and well restored from the original masters with the cooperation of the Fassbinder Foundation. Despite its age and slightly dated look it is as powerful now as when it was made.

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This review will appear in Volume 3 No. 4 of the digital and print edition of Synergy Magazine.

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