Bad Timing (1980)    World Northal/Drama    RT: 123 minutes    Rated R* (strong sexual content, full frontal nudity, rape, language, drug use)    Director: Nicolas Roeg    Screenplay: Yale Udoff    Music: Richard Hartley    Cinematography: Anthony B. Richmond    Release date: October 25, 1980 (US)    Cast: Art Garfunkel, Theresa Russell, Harvey Keitel, Denholm Elliot.    Box Office: N/A

Rating: NO STARS!!!

 I would rather sit through 100 mindless grade-Z exploitation movies than a single film as utterly pretentious as Bad Timing, a psychological drama from Nicolas Roeg (Don’t Look Now, The Man Who Fell to Earth). It’s hard to say what was going through the filmmaker’s mind when he decided to regale us with this tale of a troubling relationship between a dull-witted psychoanalyst and a disturbed woman. Oh, did I say regale? I meant bore us to death.

 There are only four characters in Bad Timing you need concern yourself with; Dr. Alex Linden (singer Garfunkel), Milena (Russell, Black Widow), Inspector Netusil (Keitel, Taxi Driver) and Stefan (Elliott, Raiders of the Lost Ark). The different lovers, colleagues, students, doctors and policemen with whom they cross paths periodically are merely window dressing and don’t matter in the slightest.

 Once again, Roeg opts to tell his story in flashback form with Netusil interrogating Linden at a Vienna hospital about why Milena swallowed a whole bottle of pills. The flashbacks reveal the doctor was involved in a sexual relationship with the free-spirited young woman taking a break from her much older husband Stefan across the border. He’s really into her; she’s not into the whole commitment thing. Desire becomes love; love turns to obsession. She walks out on him. He can’t forget her. Her mental state begins to deteriorate. He doesn’t care anymore. She threatens to kill herself. He doesn’t believe her. She almost dies before he finally calls for help. The police have questions. Something doesn’t add up. I think that about covers it… almost.

 Although I typically make it a habit not to drop spoilers, I believe I’ll make an exception in this case. It’s the only way to explain why Bad Timing ultimately sickened me. Trust me when I say you’ll thank me later for saving you from a most miserable viewing experience. Linden takes his sweet time getting to Milena’s apartment after she calls him to say her final goodbye. When he gets there, she’s barely conscious. He taunts her for a while before she lapses into unconsciousness on the floor. He then carries her to the bed where he proceeds to rape her. When he’s done, he dresses her and calls for an ambulance. Excuse me while I barf.

 There are a ton of questions I could ask about Bad Timing, but none as pressing as the one surrounding Linden’s competence as a mental health expert. He’s good enough to teach at the local university yet doesn’t seem to realize that Milena is manic depressive. How do you miss something like that? If he does realize, isn’t it an ethical violation to get involved with her? Shouldn’t he be reporting it to somebody so she can get help? This guy obviously has no morals.

The acting in Bad Timing is horrendous. Garfunkel, who also starred in Carnal Knowledge, delivers a performance that mainly consists of smoking a lot of cigarettes and going around with a dour expression on his face at all times. For some reason, Keitel adapts the speech patterns of Christopher Walken when reciting his lines. If Roeg wanted that, why didn’t he just hire Walken himself? Elliott does little more than look annoyed at his wife’s erratic behavior and promiscuity. Russell is okay until she cranks it up to 11 in her depiction of her character’s broken mental state. In a different movie, it would be funny. Here it’s just sad and desperate.

 If somebody was to ask me what Bad Timing is really about, I’d reply most emphatically with this one-word answer: “Nothing!” It tells a story with no point or purpose. It’s a two-hour visit with four people so shallow and unlikable; you wouldn’t want to spend two minutes with any one of them. Yet Roeg appears to think he’s making a grand artistic statement or something. About what, I haven’t the faintest idea. He fills his movie with deep, meaningful statements like “You tell the truth about a lie so beautifully.” and “I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out what normal means.” In a note to Linden, Milena states, “I wish you’d understand me less and love me more.” Dialogue like this only sounds intelligent to people who think fortune cookies contain great wisdom.

 Bad Timing is a prime example of cinema gone wrong. It’s neither art nor entertainment. It doesn’t even work as a dirty movie. It’s one of the biggest put-ons I’ve ever seen. It’s for idiots with college degrees who try to find deep meaning in everything. They can look all they want but they won’t find it here. Bad Timing is as shallow as they come. I’ve seen episodes of The Love Boat with more intelligence. I’ve listened to long lectures more interesting than this lousy movie. It sinks about as low as one can go with that awful rape scene. Honestly, there is no good time to watch Bad Timing. I’m going to do my best to forget it.

*= originally rated X, later changed to R