OK its October, the nights are drawing in, its getting darker out there, and well its about time for a film review so I thought I would go for a somewhat dark film, and this one is Strange Days, starring Ralph Fiennes in a sci-fi vouyeristic film, directed by Kathryn Bigelow back in 1995. So let's do the usual, give the film a look, so plug in your headset (or Squid set, all will be explained ahead) and close your eyes...
So the film is set in Los Angeles in the year 1999, and the film's main character, Lenny Nero (Fiennes) who was a former LAPD cop, but is now turned to being a black marketeer, selling tapes of recorded memories on a device called a SQUID (Superconducting Quantum Interface Device). The SQUID records memories direct from the cerebral cortex and the person recording them wears a headpiece in their hair along with a mini-disc cassette recorder, which captures the images to a disc. Lenny at the start of the film views a bootleg SQUID recording of a robbery, and the person who recorded the robbery was killed while trying to escape. Lenny who refuses to deal in snuff clips or as he calls it "blackjack" insists the dealer he got it from, Tick (Richard Edson) cut out the final part when the robber dies, and takes the clip at a reduced price. Meanwhile a call girl named Iris (Brigette Bako) is chased by two police officers down into a subway where she flees on a subway train, however before she does one of the officers smashes the train window and grabs Iris's head pulling off a wig, which reveals a SQUID headset beneath it.
Lenny in the meantime after finishing a night's work is approached by Iris who urgently tells him she has a tape for him to watch, but she runs away when she notices a nearby police car, having put the tape inside Lenny's car. However before Lenny can find the tape his car is towed away, and he calls up his friend Lornette "Mace" Mason (Angela Bassett) to give him a ride home. Lenny also pines for his ex-girlfriend, Faith (Juliette Lewis) who was once a former call girl, and is now an aspiring rock singer, who's new boyfriend is a big music industry mogul, Philo Gant (Michael Wincott). Hours later though, Lenny receives a blackjack clip, which shows footage of Iris being raped then murdered. Lenny distraught at seeing the tape, shows the clip to his best friend and private investigator, Max Peltier (Tom Sizemore) and the two of them along with Mace work together to try and put the pieces together as to what is behind Iris's murder. Lenny soon receives more snuff tapes, one of which reveals footage of a prominent rapper, Jeriko One (Glenn Plummer) being gunned down along with one of his band members by two renegade police officers, Steckler and Engleman (Vincent D'Onofrio and William Fichtner) and Iris, who was with Jeriko at the time witnessed the murders (and recorded the event on her SQUID headset). And from here Lenny along with help from Mace and Max tries to find a way to expose the police corruption behind Jeriko's murder, without starting a full scale riot in an already volatible LA, while he tries to rescue Faith from suffering a similar fate to Iris.
While it wasn't a commerical success at the time of its release, Strange Days is still a very entertaining and intruiging film, and has a lot going for it with some fine performances and some good ideas in the story. The idea of the virtual reality of living the memories of other people and feeling the sensations of the events helps give the film a unique spin, and also taps well into the whole vouyerism theme, which in previous films such as Slither (with Sharon Stone) was done poorly. It also of course mirrors the tensions of the LA riots of that period, as well as the Rodney King beating, which is reflected later in the scene where Mace is attacked by LAPD officers when she defends herself against the two renegade cops. And Jeriko one's death is also another take on the LA riots, as a prominent rap artist who is hugely influential in the media and the public in being outspoken against the terror tactics used by the LAPD. So between its themes of vouyerism, the LA riots and the year 2000, there is quite a lot going on in Strange Days, throw into that one man's obssession with the past and you've got quite a strange concoction indeed!
Moving onto the performances well they are all excellent, particularly Fiennes in his role as Lenny, who is something of a dichotomy, as on one hand he is a sleazy pedlar of bootleg clips, but on the other he does have a moral compass of sorts as he looks out for his ex-girlfriend Faith, and his friend Mace, who as it turns out has unrequieted feelings for him. And essentially Fiennes plays Lenny as a fundamentally flawed but good guy at heart, who is willing ultimately to do the right thing. Fiennes in his role as Lenny get's some good lines as well, one of which is when he looks through his closet and tries to find a good tie, or rather a very garish one and he says "Oh no! This tie doesn't go with blue!". Also in the scene where he and Mace are in a car chase with the two crazed cops who open fire at them, Mace says "don't worry the glass is bullet resistant" and Lenny replies "Bullet resistant! Whatever happened to bullet proof!".
Angela Bassett is also really good in her role as Mace, a bodyguard (and clearly you see that Angela put some work in on her phyisique!) who is also Lenny's friend, and she plays Mace as a tough but compassionate woman. Angela get's some good lines, of which perhaps the most memorable is when she grabs Lenny and throws him against the wall as he tries to grab his SQUID tapes of Faith, and she says "This is your life! Right here! Right now!!". She also has an amusing scene with Lenny where she drives a client to a meeting with Lenny in the back pedalling his SQUID clips to the man, Mace loses her temper and throws him out the car, with Lenny leaping onto her car as she tries to drive off. Mace then stops the car to let Lenny back in, and he puts his head through the open glass window, as he asks "can we talk about this rationally?" and she pushes the button to wind the window up to his throat and he gasps saying "That would be no!".
In the other performances Tom Sizemore is great as Max, Lenny's quirky best friend (who has a ridiculous long haired wig, that looks like it belongs in a porno!) who helps him try to find what's behind Iris's death and what connects it to the death of Jeriko One. Sizemore who is no stranger to playing dark characters makes Max quite likeable but also edgy as you find out near the end he isn't what he appears to be. He also get's some of the film's best lines, one of which is after he watches the snuff tape of Iris's death, he throws away his Chinese food container and says "Well I've lost my appetite! For about a year!". Also later on when he says to Lenny "You know, statistically Jesus is the second most common word people say before they die. Shit: being number one!". Juliette Lewis is excellent in her role as Faith, the aspiring rock singer, who was once Lenny's girlfriend, but she has now outgrown him and moved on and grows weary of his continual advances to get back into her life and she says to him at one point "You know how the movies are better than playback (i.e the SQUID tapes), there are credits, the film ends and the curtain closes and you know its over." and she angrily turns to Lenny and yells "Its OVER!!!".
Michael Wincott who has a fine line in playing bad guys, also puts in a suitably creepy performance as the music industry mogul, Filo Gant, who becomes obssessed and paranoid with Faith as well the acts he has under his control (as he has them wired up with SQUID devices to keep tabs on them). Wincott curiously enough uses an English accent for the role, and it has to be said its isn't a great one either, however it doesn't really detract too much from his performance. Wincott also has some good dialogue, particularly in the scene where he berates Lenny and says to him "You go back to whever the fuck it is you came from and never cross my vision again!"and later on after he rows with Faith and hits her, he kneels down to her and says "The only time a whore should open her mouth, is when she's giving head!". Also in another Faith says to Gant how paranoid he has become and he says "paranoia is just reality on a finer scale". Richard Edson is also really good in his role as the nervy bootleg dealer, Tick, who is asthmatic, and in the scene where he views the clip of Iris's murder he get's a great line as he gasps after and says "Wow! That was one unbelievable piece of eyefuck!".
Glenn Plummer is not too bad as Jeriko although he is somewhat underused in the film, but his execution scene is pretty good as he taunts the two psycho cops but saying "You pulled over the wrong black man, officer. I'm the 800 pound gorrilla in your mist and I earn more money in a day than you make in a whole year! And my lawyer loves sending sorryass Robocop Aryan fuckers like you to jail!". And lastly I will mention Vincent D'Onofrio and William Fichtner who do well enough in their roles as the pyscho cops who are out to try and recover the tape of them murdering Jeriko, with D'Onofrio making the more prominent appearance as the demented officer Steckler.
As for the direction, Kathryn Bigelow does a great job here as she keeps the action and suspense of the film moving at a fast pace, and she handles the use of the SQUID playback images really well. Some of these also have a colour filter in them (which are used in the scenes with Iris's killer) and Bigelow is no stranger to directing and staging fast paced hand held camera sequences, as we see in the scene at the start with the robbers, and is akin to the skilfully shot chase scene in Point Break (with Keanu Reeves chasing Patrick Swayze). Getting onto the film's music score, by Graeme Revell which is excellent and it features plenty of great atmospheric pieces. The film also featuers some good tracks from other artists such as Skunk Anansie's "Selling Jesus", PJ Harvey's "Rid of me" (sung by Juliette Lewis), and the final track by Deep Forest featuring Peter Gabriel "While the Earth sleeps".
As for the film's flaws???? Well there are a one or two, to start with the film has a pretty over the top climax, particularly where it invovles the two pyscho cops as Mace beats them up, but she is then beaten up by other LAPD officers, and a young boy jumps on one of them, which starts off a big riot. And to top it off (YEP PLOT SPOILER HERE!!!) after the two cops are exposed for the murder by the police commissioner, Engleman kills himself with a gun, leaving his partner Steckland dementedly dragging his partner's handcuffed body with him (with his partner's blood on his face) toward Mace, as he grins wildly like he has just came out of the set of The Shining! At this point the film's credibility really takes a big dive out of a forty story window and it let's things down as the film moves to its conclusion. You could also probably argue it tries to be a bit too ambitious in tying all the plot strands together, and between the LA Riots, Iris and Jeriko's murders, the psycho cops, and Lenny's own personal drama. Especially with Faith as after she saves Lenny from being killed by Max (who killed Gant), she goes to jail, but its not really made clear why she goes to jail. Did she take the rap for Gant's murder? Its just all left a bit unresolved.
Despite all that, Strange Days does largely succeed as a vouyeristic thriller and it has plenty going for it and if you seen it yet, well it just might be worth giving it a go.
And I will leave it there.
No comments:
Post a Comment