Rube Goldberg device

“It makes me think of a Rube Goldberg device,” he said.

The utility of jokes is that they are perfectly engineered to trick minds out of ruts, manipulate thoughts in one direction or another, a Rube Goldberg device delighting through distraction.

Meadowlands Arena became his personal Rube Goldberg device: The scoreboard listed each scene and take being filmed, and the hockey goal horn signaled cameras to start rolling.

For close to an hour, you watch as this metaphysical Rube Goldberg device plays out, as a succession of formal delights and narrative surprises are harmonized into a single, flowing movement that feels both utterly convincing and thrillingly irrational.

Made of scrap found in New Jersey junkyards, the massive work — 27 feet high and 23 feet in length — was supposed to be a mechanical display, sort of like a Rube Goldberg device.