|
The Black Dahlia |
||
|
By : Suzanne Philips |
Movie Reviews List | |
|
THE BLACK DAHLIA Pre-Release screening 2/06 Directed by Brian De Palma (Scarface, The Untouchables) Screenplay by Josh Friedman (War of the Worlds) based on the book by James Ellroy(L.A. Confidential) Starring Josh Hartnett (The Faculty, Pearl Harbor), Aaron Eckhart (Paycheck), Mia Kirshner(The L Word), Scarlett Johansson (Match Point), Hilary Swank (Million Dollar Baby) Current Running Time 2 1/2 hours Rated R THE BLACK DAHLIA is the story of two LAPD officers Leland "Lee" Blanchard (Aaron Eckhart) and Dwight "Bucky" Bleichert(Josh Hartnett) in 1940's Los Angeles who are put into Homicide to investigate the infamous murder of Elizabeth Short (Mia Kirshner), known as the "Black Dahlia". I try to find something positive to say about every film, I really do. Some films don't work well, but often times this is due to a bad script, direction, editing, music, etc, and there are still some good points to the film. I find myself having a very hard time finding anything good to say about THE BLACK DAHLIA. Having read Ellroy's book, I expected to see sometime somewhat similar to L.A. CONFIDENTIAL. Boy, was I mistaken!! This film can't even hope and aspire to ever be L.A. CONFIDENTIAL! From what I remember of the book, the screenplay veers way off course. The film version focuses on the two policemen played by Eckhart and Hartnett, who start the film in different divisions of the LAPD, but who are brought together by A.D.A. Ellis Loew (Patrick Fishler -Swimming with Sharks) in a scheme to get a proposition passed by voters. Loew has the brilliant idea to stage a charity boxing match and get voters behind a new police boxing league and then get them to pass this proposition to bring more funding into the LAPD. He knows that both Lee and Bucky were semi-famous boxers before becoming cops and bills them as "Fire and Ice"(???). Not to give too much of the story away to anyone who might actually want to see this film, but one of the guys throws the match and they both end up with new high profile assignments in the LAPD as partners. The whole boxing setup and scenes are both tedious and pointless. I understand De Palma is trying to set up how the characters came to be partners and their history, but why he wastes so much time on this I am still trying to figure out. Add to that the never-ending voice-overs in the first 30 minutes and you are already waiting for it to end. After the fighting debacle is over, we then get to watch the new partners arrest and shoot some low-level criminals and bond with each other and Lee's girlfriend Kay (Scarlett Johansson). Almost 45 minutes into the film and we haven't even heard anyone mention The Black Dahlia!!!! Excuse me? They really need to change the title of this film because honestly, it is very misleading. Finally we get to the discovery of the gruesome remains of Elizabeth Short and the two detectives get embroiled in the case and further and further into their own destruction. The problem with this film, well one of the numerous problems, is that there are so many diversions from the plot, it seems as though the filmmakers were unclear as to which film they wanted to make. Many characters are introduced and tangent from the actual storyline of the case and make little sense as to why they are brought up at all. Honestly, this film is like watching a bad Mexican Soap Opera on Telemundo. The cheesy music and melodramatic acting is actually laughable. Aaron Eckhart is way over the top as Lee, to the point of being comical. Josh Hartnett, while very pretty and there is a nice shot of his naked bum which was one of the few saving graces of this film, was unintentionally funny and the scenes of him doing a slow burn of anger are real side splitters. I don't think this is what the filmmakers were going for but....Scarlett Johansson has nothing to do but look pretty and stare vacantly at the other actors. The only standouts are Mia Kirshner as Elizabeth Short
and Hillary Swank as socialite Madeleine Spraque Linscott. Kirshner really
humanizes Short and I really wish there had been more scenes with her in
this
film. Swank is outstanding as Linscott, a bored socialite who is a Black
Dahlia look alike with too much time on her hands. The only really great
scene
in the film comes when Bucky goes to dinner at the Linscott mansion and is
confronted with overbearing patriarch Emmet Linscott (John Kavanagh), highly
medicated and extremely comical mother Linscott and Madeleine's perverted
sister who draws inappropriate caricatures at the dinner table. If only they
would show this one scene and then let you leave the theatre... |
|