Rush 8: Malcovich

For Craig, being with Maxine would be the union of the two sides of the Mobius strip.

He can't be with Maxine by being Craig so he "goes around the strip" to become John Malcovich. It looks like this solved his problem for a while, but then he gets a phone call from Lester. He realizes that now he can't be with Maxine by being John Malcovich. So he tries to go back around and be Craig, thinking that this time he will be successful.

But in a very powerful and summarizing scene, as he falls out of Malcovich, Maxine drives away with Lottie, and Craig is on the wrong side of the chasm. He shouts out that he will be Malcovich again, still believing that this will get him the chance to be with her. He has gone round and round the Mobius strip and Maxine is still on the "opposite side" at the end.

In the diegetic world of this film, Craig's efforts to win Maxine literally alienate his substance from itself, as he has to rapidly alternate between physically being someone else and physically being himself. More broadly, the universal idea of "getting to be inside someone else" becomes the concrete here, a physical activity that the characters engage in. The physical action of it in turn becomes the universal, the principle and factor that rules all human social/sexual/romantic relationships in the film.