Identities & Characters
The characters in Phase Variations find themselves at a crossroads – the moment where education ends and adult experience begins, where the responsibility of our lives definitively passes from our parents to ourselves. The five characters – Otis, Chloe, Josh, Niki and Anna - are searching for their place in the world. They’re working the first or second jobs of their careers, discovering the possible roads they may take through life, telling stories about their lives and discussing philosophical ideas that they hope will give them some insight into the world they find themselves in.
They each have their own way of managing the phase transition, and some are managing better than others. Josh is cynical and angry, taking on life with his metaphorical (and sometimes literal) fists raised; Anna is questioning and experimental, keeping an open-mind, until she finds a narrative she is comfortable with; Chloe is quiet and thoughtful, using other’s characteristics and needs, while observing and learning from life around her to enable herself to emerge as the person she thinks the world needs her to be; Niki, while a bit older than the others, has decided that this period of change is where she feels comfortable and she has allowed herself to become defined by the very phase they are going through - she’s left childhood behind, but resolutely refuses to grow up in the traditional sense of the word; Otis is a man who has lost his identity, cut adrift by the failed promises and illusions of his recently ended relationship. He doesn’t even know that he is searching for meaning, let alone what he is actually looking for. To use his own word – he is ‘empty’.
And this is what makes him the perfect specimen for the sixth character in the film - the Alien life-force - to contaminate. Otis’ struggles typify the struggles of humanity: our search for meaning; understanding our place in the universe; our difficulty in dealing with extreme emotions like love. In this way he is a proxy for humanity as a whole. The Alien, from Otis’ perspective, is the antithesis of this. It shows Otis the true nature of space and time and seemingly answers all the of the questions Otis has. The Alien gives him clarity, meaning and an identity. It gives clarity to what was previously opaque. Otis finally understands everything.
THEMES
Reality versus fantasy. Subjectivity versus objectivity. The mind versus the body. Life versus death. Individualism versus collectivism. The finite versus the infinite. These dichotomies are the root of what makes us human – they create division, conflict, religions, debates, arguments. And the Alien has given Otis a definitive understanding of the true nature of time and space, but at the same time it has taken away the very core of what makes him human. In addition, the Alien infection has made him a more complete and contented person, with a few special abilities thrown in for good measure.
But this newfound being and understanding has a dark side. Otis is convinced that if everyone else could see things the way he now does, they would all be better for it. He has been radicalised by the Alien. He has been set on a path that he believes everyone must take, and his insistence on this involves eradicating other’s individual choices.
Ideas of radicalisation and enforcing one’s own way of being onto others is a very relevant concern in the world today. We see more and more division and violence as differing ideologies battle for supremacy the world over. Sometimes these differences are played out in the political world, at other times they have more serious, often deadly, consequences.
Otis’ experiences in the film add another angle to the debate. What if his contamination is indeed the best way forward for everyone? While subjectively, Otis’ desire for the others to experience a similar transition to him may seem fascistic and fundamentalist, objectively it may well be a better route forward for humanity as, by undergoing the contamination, humanity could indeed think as one voice, where conflict and division no longer exist.
The alien lifeform
The Alien appears to us, and the other characters as light. It absorbs energy from atoms it comes into contact with until it has enough energy to emerge from its dormant state. Having absorbed enough energy to awaken, it waits in the safety of its orb until it is ready to cross over into a more suitable, earth-bound being within which it can survive.
Once the Alien has attached itself to a host, it then starts to learn and adapt to the physical make up of the body it has settled in. In Otis’ case it attaches itself to his nervous system before slowly permeating through the rest of his body, until it has taken control of all major function of his body.
The Alien doesn’t completely eradicate everything that makes Otis what he is. It’s too smart for that. It uses his body and mind as a conduit to be able to survive on this new planet. It changes and adapts Otis so that he is completely in-sync with its way of thinking and existing. The Alien is akin to an infectious idea or virus. It uses the tools available within its host to prepare the spreading of its species on its new home. In other words, it adapts to its surroundings, in this case it adapts to being the driver of a human being. But unlike a virus or bacteria, it doesn’t physically harm its host. It creates a version that it views as superior to the original, adding just enough ability and life, to convince its host that it is better off with the Alien as a part of its being.