I'm sure most people on this newsgroup know that the episode "Trilogy of Error" incorporates components from the German movie "Run Lola Run," but have any of you actually sat down and watched this movie? I recommend it very highly! It's not that easy to scrounge up a copy, but I believe it will prove to be worth your troubles.
Ostensibly, the parody is that of Lisa running here and there to get to her school for the Science Fair (bad rhyme intended), but in fact "Run Lola Run" also shares the theme of three distinct segments. It's different, to be sure. Rather than the same story told from three different points of view, as in the case of The Simpsons, the actual movie is told from the same point of view, but with temporal differences. In in the second segment, Lola falls several seconds behind right at the beginning, and in the final segment she leaps several seconds ahead at the beginning.
Until the end of the first segment, I thought "Run Lola Run" was corny, with the exception of the photographic expos�s of several bit characters' futures. But that was before I knew that the movie had three distinct parts. Once Lola gets shot, things become very interesting and remain so for the rest of the movie. There are plenty of meaningful, thought-provoking ideas to consider when time repeats itself once, and then twice.
You won't find much in this movie to remind you of The Simpsons, but by the time you realize that, you will already be deep into the movie, and enjoying yourself too much to care.
Plus, it's a hell of a lot better than "Trilogy of Error."
~Josh
P.S. In Germany, the female movie stars look like real people...compared with inhuman clone-monsters like Jennifer Lopez, who can't act and shouldn't try.