Post by Bartwald on Nov 5, 2006 5:26:36 GMT -5
THE BLACK DAHLIA (2006)
Director: Brian De Palma
Cast: Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart, Hilary Swank, Mia Kirschner
Grade: 7/10
Okay, so Brian De Palma seems satisfied with his movie: he's glad that it's true to the source book and mirrors its "mosaic, no-linear" style; he's glad that it's not an overly viewer-friendly movie, as with some pride he pronounces it to be "a little more to digest than your average episode of CSI". What's more, the author of the source novel, James Ellroy, seems to be satisfied with the adaptation, too. The writer admits De Palma's take on the story "captures the violence and the elements of power", and then he goes on to praise the actors - especially Mia Kirshner and Josh Hartnett. But is The Black Dahlia as good as we all hoped? Or more precisely - is it as good as another adaptation of Ellroy's book, the famous L.A. Confidential?
The short answer would be: no. It's not as gripping as L.A. Confidential and it doesn't have all these interesting, meaty characters. The Black Dahlia is prettier than L.A. Confidential - it may be the year's prettiest movie, actually - but beauty is not all, not even if talk a De Palma film. In the past the director might have been successful in making some films that had the looks but didn't seem to have the brains, but they were either fruit of De Palma's love for the gratuitous B-movie style or proofs for his artistic independence - wild, unashamed pieces that he wrote and directed, putting all his love and energy in it. The Black Dahlia, on the other hand, is an uneasy compromise. De Palma decided to hide his style behind Ellroy's story - and it perhaps could have worked fine, had the story been a little more interesting and fresher than it is.
The plot of The Black Dahlia doesn't hold many surprises for the viewer, and that's perhaps its greatest flaw. We're in Los Angeles, in the perfectly recreated 1940s, and we observe two handsome detectives, "Bucky" (Hartnett) and "Lee" (Eckhart), who investigate a brutal and puzzling murder of a young actress. They cover each other's back when there's some shooting involved, they watch the films and auditions the deceased has recorded, and they are in love with the same girl - the sexy and provocative but also sensitive and somewhat helpless Kay Lake (Johansson)... And here the problems begin. The love triangle - not much connected to the murder mystery - is much more interesting than the police investigation; the competition between the two detectives is, in fact, the heart of the movie, and whenever the plot steers away from this in favour of picking up the unclear hints and clues as to who killed the girl - our interest wanes. The Black Dahlia struggles to be a murder mystery but the murder itself is the least interesting thing in it. And it doesn't help that De Palma decided to abandon his trademark approach to filming violence (think the baseball bat scene in The Untouchables): what we get of it in The Black Dahlia seems restrained, saturated. Some viewers will be glad to know that the director did his best not to treat violence gratuitously this time around but, and I'm really sorry to announce this, it doesn't work well for The Black Dahlia's impact on the viewers.
By no means, however, is The Black Dahlia a bad or even an average film. Several scenes are wonderful reminders of De Palma's visual genius (the boxing scene, the suspense before the shootout), the photography is mesmerising throughout, and the actors shine in a handsome, old-fashioned way (and not just Hartnett and Kirschner but also Eckhart who is convincingly wild in his role, Johansson who is unbearably sexy, and Swank who is weird yet definitely attractive). If only the script were more surprising and the final revelation more shattering, The Black Dahlia could knock L.A. Confidential dead - but that's asking a lot, is it not?
Director: Brian De Palma
Cast: Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart, Hilary Swank, Mia Kirschner
Grade: 7/10
Okay, so Brian De Palma seems satisfied with his movie: he's glad that it's true to the source book and mirrors its "mosaic, no-linear" style; he's glad that it's not an overly viewer-friendly movie, as with some pride he pronounces it to be "a little more to digest than your average episode of CSI". What's more, the author of the source novel, James Ellroy, seems to be satisfied with the adaptation, too. The writer admits De Palma's take on the story "captures the violence and the elements of power", and then he goes on to praise the actors - especially Mia Kirshner and Josh Hartnett. But is The Black Dahlia as good as we all hoped? Or more precisely - is it as good as another adaptation of Ellroy's book, the famous L.A. Confidential?
The short answer would be: no. It's not as gripping as L.A. Confidential and it doesn't have all these interesting, meaty characters. The Black Dahlia is prettier than L.A. Confidential - it may be the year's prettiest movie, actually - but beauty is not all, not even if talk a De Palma film. In the past the director might have been successful in making some films that had the looks but didn't seem to have the brains, but they were either fruit of De Palma's love for the gratuitous B-movie style or proofs for his artistic independence - wild, unashamed pieces that he wrote and directed, putting all his love and energy in it. The Black Dahlia, on the other hand, is an uneasy compromise. De Palma decided to hide his style behind Ellroy's story - and it perhaps could have worked fine, had the story been a little more interesting and fresher than it is.
The plot of The Black Dahlia doesn't hold many surprises for the viewer, and that's perhaps its greatest flaw. We're in Los Angeles, in the perfectly recreated 1940s, and we observe two handsome detectives, "Bucky" (Hartnett) and "Lee" (Eckhart), who investigate a brutal and puzzling murder of a young actress. They cover each other's back when there's some shooting involved, they watch the films and auditions the deceased has recorded, and they are in love with the same girl - the sexy and provocative but also sensitive and somewhat helpless Kay Lake (Johansson)... And here the problems begin. The love triangle - not much connected to the murder mystery - is much more interesting than the police investigation; the competition between the two detectives is, in fact, the heart of the movie, and whenever the plot steers away from this in favour of picking up the unclear hints and clues as to who killed the girl - our interest wanes. The Black Dahlia struggles to be a murder mystery but the murder itself is the least interesting thing in it. And it doesn't help that De Palma decided to abandon his trademark approach to filming violence (think the baseball bat scene in The Untouchables): what we get of it in The Black Dahlia seems restrained, saturated. Some viewers will be glad to know that the director did his best not to treat violence gratuitously this time around but, and I'm really sorry to announce this, it doesn't work well for The Black Dahlia's impact on the viewers.
By no means, however, is The Black Dahlia a bad or even an average film. Several scenes are wonderful reminders of De Palma's visual genius (the boxing scene, the suspense before the shootout), the photography is mesmerising throughout, and the actors shine in a handsome, old-fashioned way (and not just Hartnett and Kirschner but also Eckhart who is convincingly wild in his role, Johansson who is unbearably sexy, and Swank who is weird yet definitely attractive). If only the script were more surprising and the final revelation more shattering, The Black Dahlia could knock L.A. Confidential dead - but that's asking a lot, is it not?
