Amsterdam. Gerard Leve is a cynical novelist struggling not only with alcohol, but also with his faith in Catholicism on one hand and his bisexual urges on the other. He arrives in a different city for a lecture in front of his fans, where he later meets the blond Christine. The two have sex at her home. However, Gerard has strange hallucinations during his stay in the city. He finds three film reels, plays them and is shocked that it shows Christine's three former husbands, all of whom died from mysterious circumstances: one died when his parachute failed to open; the other was killed by a lion; the third in a boat accident. When Christine's lover, Herman, shows up, Gerard warns him that Christine might be planing to kill her fourth husband. Gerard is also attracted to Herman and makes out with him at the cemetery. While driving, Herman dies when a hanging construction metal pierces him in the car. Gerard is traumatized in the hospital, while Christine finds a new lover.
Paul Verhoeven's final Dutch film before his departure to the US is a peculiar erotic psychological drama that is an "aborted thriller", since it starts with hints and foreshadowing of a danger (namely that the girl ostensibly intends to kill the protagonist, "black widow"-style), only to in the end ditch such a repertoire and consolidate itself into another, drama direction: the result is a clash of different genres and perspectives, and not a clear insight into what the movie truly wants to be. Already from the opening scenes of a spider crawling all over a crucifix, and the protagonist Gerard Leve (the name of the author of the eponymous novel) waking up from his bed, standing up to reveal his penis, one already gets the impression that this is not a 'run-of-the-mill' European film, confirming once again Verhoeven's fascination with the "lower" part of the social structure, similarly as was S. Imamura. There are also several creative moments: in one of them, Gerard stops an undertaker when he thinks he sees his name on a coffin, only for the undertaker to take the folded ribbon that says "Ger-ar" and 'straighten' it out, revealing the full name of the ribbon: "Guido Hermans". In another, while holding a lecture, Gerard tells to the audience: "I lie the truth". However, initial suspense elements fade away in the final third, since "The 4th Man" actually has a different theme: Gerard's hallucinations are actually one giant internal strife caused by his rift between the (conservative) Catholicism and his (liberal) gay attraction looming inside him, as well as his existential impossibility to comprehend the meaninglessness of death, so he tries to find patterns and explanations where there are none. This is summed up in his hallucination of seeing Herman on a cross in church, and pulling down Herman's underwear. While these bizarre elements stray too far away into several contradictory directions, "The 4th Man" is still an affective experimental film.
Grade:++
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