Welt am Draht
| World on a Wire | |
|---|---|
Press info ("Presseheft") front cover
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| Directed by | Rainer Werner Fassbinder |
| Produced by |
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| Screenplay by | |
| Based on |
Simulacron-3 by Daniel F. Galouye |
| Starring |
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| Music by | Gottfried Hüngsberg |
| Cinematography |
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| Edited by |
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| Distributed by | Janus Films |
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Release date
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1973 (TV) |
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Running time
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205 minutes (I: 100 / II: 105) |
| Country | West Germany |
| Language | German |
World on a Wire (German: Welt am Draht), is a 1973 science fiction television serial directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Shot in 16 mm, it was made for German television and originally aired in 1973, as a two-part miniseries. Starring Klaus Löwitsch, it was based on the novel Simulacron-3 by Daniel F. Galouye. An adaptation of the Fassbinder version was presented as the play World of Wires, directed by Jay Scheib, in 2012. Its focus is not on action, but on sophistic and philosophic aspects of the human mind, simulation, and the role of scientific research.
It is the present day. Cybernetics and Future Science's (Institut für Kybernetik und Zukunftsforschung) new supercomputer hosts a simulation program that includes an artificial world with over 9,000 "identity units" who live as human beings, unaware that their world is just a simulation. Professor Vollmer (Adrian Hoven), who is technical director of the program, is apparently on the verge of an incredible secret discovery. He becomes increasingly agitated and anti-social before dying in a mysterious accident. His successor, Dr. Fred Stiller, has a discussion with Günther Lause, the security adviser of the institute, when the latter suddenly disappears without trace, before passing on Vollmer's secret to Stiller. More mysterious still is the fact that none of the other IKZ employees seem to have any memory of Lause.
Meanwhile, one of the identity units in the simulation attempts suicide. This unit is deleted by Stiller's colleague Walfang, to keep the simulation stable. To investigate the reasons for the suicide, Stiller contacts the contact unit of the simulated world. The unit, called Einstein, is the only identity unit who knows about the simulation, and this is necessary to run the program. In an attempt to become a real person, Einstein switches his mind into Walfang's body while the latter is in contact with the simulated world. Einstein gives Stiller an explanation for the mysteries, vanishing memories, and vanishing persons. He tells him that the real world is nothing else but a simulation of a real world one level above.
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Wikipedia