Colonel Kane (Stacy Keach) is an army psychiatrist who arrives at a top secret, experimental mental asylum where military men who have suffered a mental collapse are treated with unusual methods. Kane and the resident doctor Fell (Ed Flanders) decide to give these men what they want and comply with their every demand, leading to chaos. One patient, Cutshaw (Scott Wilson), is an astronaut who had a breakdown just as his space capsule was going to be launched to the Moon. He provides Kane with his most formidable problem: prove that God exists...
The Ninth Configuration is a fascinating, frustrating, theological drama written, produced and directed by William Peter Blatty, who also appears as one of the patients (the one who thinks he's a doctor). Originally it had trouble getting released, probably because nobody knew what to make of it. Is it a comedy? A fantasy? A thriller? One thing is clear, though, Blatty's religious preoccupations run through this film just as they do The Exorcist, but here he is not concerned with the existence of the Devil, but with the existence of God, and the reason there is any goodness in the world at all.
At first we are introduced to the characters in a confusing scene where dialogue overlaps, creating the sense of random thoughts rambling through the head of a schizophrenic. The inmates are running this asylum even before Kane gives them a free hand, and there are constant interruptions where the actors can indulge themselves in acting crazy. One is trying to stage Shakespeare with dogs, one thinks he is Superman, another believes he is being held captive on the planet Venus, and yet another is determined to walk through walls so he can teach atoms a lesson.
In time the plot emerges. Kane is not all he seems; in a superb performance by Keach, he speaks calmly and reasonably while it is clear that he is wrestling with inner demons. He confides in Dr Fell about his brother, Killer Kane, who went on a rampage during the Vietnam War, and, inspired by Cutshaw's machinations, begins to take the view that the inmates are acting crazy to avoid the consequences of their actions. There is a big twist near the end, which you might be able to guess if you're paying attention, but with everyone acting eccentrically, it's difficult to tell who's mad and who's sane.
Eventually, the film appears to reach the conclusion that people go mad to avoid what really scares them. In Cutshaw's case, it's the terror that he may be alone in the Universe, that there is no God. It becomes Colonel Kane's mission to prove that, just as there is senseless evil in the world, there is also altruistic good. This culminates in an incredible scene of violence, where Kane has to save Cutshaw from a gang of Hell's Angels who are victimising him in a local bar.
Ironically Kane has to give in to the side of his personality he can't admit to to receive redemption; but Blatty's concept is flawed: for a truly selfless act, surely Kane would gain nothing for his good deed? Here he finally attains the peace of mind he so desperately craves, and the gratitude of those he has saved when he takes his religious allegory too far. The Ninth Configuration is thought provoking, but dashes your hopes for solutions by asking unanswerable questions. Watch for: the terrific dream sequences, which feature an astronaut finding the crucified Christ on the moon, and Vietnam War flashbacks. Music by Barry DeVorzon. Try and see the longest version (there are a few versions about).
