Four Sided Triangle

Years after it first came out in the United Kingdom I remember seeing Four Sided Triangle on a double bill in America. It was one of those films I never forgot. I didn't know at the time it came from the celebrated British company Hammer Pictures which gave us usually a more gory type of science fiction.

When cloning was finally achieved I remember that this was the first film I remember discussing the possibility which was fact in this film. For all the science fiction involved at heart Four Sided Triangle is a romantic and tragic film which begins in childhood of the protagonists.

Children who grow up to be Barbara Payton, John Van Eyssen, and Stephen Murray are seen and its plain early on that Murray will be the odd man out in this group. Payton is the object of their affections, Van Eyssen is the son of the local squire and Murray the abused son of the town drunk. Fortunately for him the town doctor James Hayter takes an interest in Murray and Hayter narrates the film in flashback and it is through his eyes we see what unfolds.

Both Van Eyssen and Murray go to college and study science and they perfect a 'duplicating' machine that can just duplicate inanimate things out of air. Good possibilities there. But Murray who pines for Payton wants to go further. She's married Van Eyssen, no fool she as he's got money and position. But Murray with the help of a reluctant Hayter experiments on living matter and then goes for the ultimate experiment. Amazingly enough Payton agrees to be duplicated.

I can't go any further, but I'm sure your mind boggles with all kinds of alternative endings. The two Paytons are named Lena and Helen and I will say there is something that Murray forgot in all his experimentation.

Four Sided Triangle while done on the cheap is a sensitively made film with good performances from the cast and will make you think about the issues of cloning.

Early Hammer film before they hit upon the idea that horror was the way of the future. This one is a sci-fi effort about two young scientific geniuses who invent a duplicating machine; they both are in love with the same girl but she is in love with just one of them, so the other lovesick boffin asks her if he could make a duplicate of her. That'll save the day and make everybody happy, right? Wrong! This love triangle plus duplicate is the four sided triangle of the title. I suppose the sci-fi is more of a maguffin that allows the story to explore human emotional elements. Its not a bad effort really.

**CAUTION: HUGE SPOILERS** In a rural English community, two friends called Bill (STEPHEN MURRAY) and Robin (JOHN VAN EYSSEN) invent a 'reproducer', a piece of scientific equipment which can recreate any object. They are aided in their work by Dr Harvey (JAMES HAYTER), the local GP and a close friend of theirs since they were children. During the celebrations of their fantastic discovery, Robin announces that he is to marry Lena (BARBARA PAYTON), a beautiful woman who both friends have fancied since they were children. Devastated, Bill decides to use the reproducer to create a clone of Lena for himself. However, as the clone is an exact replica, she shares the same thoughts and feelings as the real Lena.

FOUR SIDED TRIANGLE is an absurd but nevertheless enjoyable science-fiction melodrama. Along with STOLEN FACE (see my review), it is one of the very few films from this chapter in the history of Hammer and Terence Fisher to indicate the direction that the company would take when they became Britain's best horror studio. Both pictures share the same theme of a well to do man perverting his skills in order to win the affections of the woman he loves. For example, in STOLEN FACE, Dr Philip Ritter used his knowledge of plastic surgery to recreate the face of concert pianist Alice Brent on a deformed petty criminal because he couldn't marry Alice because she was already spoken for. The very same reason why Bill in FOUR SIDED TRIANGLE felt compelled to use his scientific invention to duplicate Lena. Also both Dr Ritter and Bill were so obsessed in their love for women that they were both unable to see that disastrous consequences could result. Both characters from these two early movies are comparable to Baron Frankenstein in Fisher's THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN. Even though Frankentein was more concerned with bringing the dead back to life than with his love life, he also was too oblivious to the certain doom that faced him when his creature became a criminal lunatic and he intended his creature to be perfect very much as Bill and Ritter intended theirs to be. FOUR SIDED TRIANGLE must also be the only b-picture in cinema history to have the courage of it's own lunatic convictions. This is thanks largely to Terence Fisher who opts to emphasize the causes and consequences of the characters' actions and the moral outcome as well. For instance at the end of the film the screen is filled with a biblical quote "You can either have joy or power you shall not have both". This follows the climax where Bill and one of the Lena's perish in a fire. However, one of them survived and the only way to judge between the clone and the real Lena was by a scar on the back of the latter's neck. Robin is overjoyed when its the real Lena, his wife, who has survived. This is the significance of Fisher's biblical quote. Robin had been tempted by power, but once the machine was destroyed in the blaze, his one opportunity for power was lost but he still had his wife and therefore he had joy but not power. This very much sets the standards for Fisher's skill as a director, whereas most of his films from this period such as MASK OF DUST or SPACEWAYS have nothing to commend them at all. In his best films for Hammer, he had that ability to take a ridiculous storyline and give it conviction by placing attention solely on his characters and the consequences and morality of what could happen if such things did occur in the world. The cast sensibly play it straight and all are suited to their roles with James Hayter shining as Dr Harvey who aids the men in their experiments but at the same time warns them of the dangers they face. John Van Eyssen who was later the head of Columbia Pictures would appear as Jonathan Harker in Fisher's classic Dracula (1958).

Flawed but compelling semi-classic British 1950s sci-fi. Four-Sided Triangle (a clever title which perfectly conveys the story and themes - based on the novel of the same name) is known to aficionados, but has been largely and undeservedly forgotten by the larger cinephile culture. Like most British science fiction of that era it is idea and story driven rather than being driven by special effects. If the archetype of a scientist standing next to a tube into which a person steps sounds familiar, it's interesting to note that this movie predates The American film The Fly by three years. The flaws include missed opportunities (which I can't describe without giving away spoilers) and a pedestrian ending that takes no risks. Nonetheless, if you like British science fiction from that era Four-Sided Triangle is a must-see.

Hey, guys! Did you and your buddy ever chase after the same girl, and lose the girl to your buddy? Sure, we all have. How many of you went out and tried to find a girl *just* like the one you lost? Okay, most of us are still here. Now, how many of you actually went out and tried to reproduce the girl of your dreams? Nope, me neither.

Robin and Bill are buddy mad scientists who are both childhood friends with Lena. Robin & Bill develop a device which makes an exact duplicate of whatever you put into the machine. The amount of energy required to change energy to matter, let alone the ability to exactly order that energy into anything useful, is beyond comprehension or reason. However, it does pose an interesting thought experiment about the nature of identity and what makes one unique in God's universe.

Helen is tortured because she realizes not only does she not have her own identity, but that the man she loves is loved by her "twin". Her world-view is the same as Lena's was before she married Robin. Helen is depressed to the point of suicide realizing that she can never be anything but a shadow of Lena. Bill is miserable because he has lost the girl of his dreams twice to the same man. His cowardace in love contrasts sharply to the point of curiousity with his impetuous, heart-on-his sleeve emotions in other aspects of his life.

The ending gets a demerit because of the need to dress them exactly for the first time in order to build a dramatic conclusion for the audience. Considering that the barn fire claims either Lena or Helen, a more dramatic ending would have had the survivor wrapped in a blanket, and the eventual hospital scene played out there. The emotion of the discovery of the survivor against the burning fire would dovetail nicely. However, this is nitpicking in an otherwise great movie.

Sterno says pull Euclid out of geometry class to watch Four Sided Triangle.