A mindbending and surreal tour-de-force from Crow director Alex Proyas, Dark City is a hardcore sci-fi high concept which, despite being mostly forgotten by the viewing public (apart from an avid cult following), still stands tall as an absolute gem from the late nineties, one with all the makings of a sleeper classic.
The titular city is a strangely anachronistic, claustraphobic metropolis that never sees daylight, populated by citizens who on mass are rendered unconscious each and every time the clock strikes midnight. One of said inhabitants is John Murdoch (Rufus Sewell), who wakes up in a hotel room bathtub with no memory of who he is, the only clues to his origin being a suitcase apparently his, and a dead girl in the next room. Receiving an urgent call from mysterious, frantic psychiatrist Daniel Schreber (Kiefer Sutherland), John makes a quick getaway before the arrival of a troupe of sinisterly tall and pale men in period regalia.
Apparently having been the subject of an experiment gone awry, John quickly discovers that he is the prime suspect in a series of murders being investigated by grizzled Inspector Frank Bumstead (William Hurt), and has to act quickly to avoid the long arm of the law and the strange men who stalk him (led by Richard O'Brien's Mr Hand), all while trying to piece together his fractured existence, which apparently includes estranged wife Emma (Jennifer Connelly).
The film noir grounding is soon revealed to be a front, as John finds that a group of unseen, technologically superior keepers are secretly manipulating the lives of the city dwellers when they sleep, and that he now possesses the power to fight back against the dark visitors, who, it turns out, are not quite human...
Displaying the visual flair and relentless pace that made The Crow such a surprise hit, Alex Proyas here displays a smart and mature sensibility in approaching a story that is, for lack of a better term, nightmarish. The dreamlike quality of the piece, enhanced by a brooding, overbearing atmosphere and a general sense of loneliness and anxiety, is one of the main reasons that Dark City is quickly able to hook you in, dragging your attentive stare towards its various dramatic turns, carpet pulling twists and breathtaking setpieces. Set pieces, incidentally, which have aged well.
While the 'unwitting experiment subject in a rat's maze' plot is so heavily exploited that it deserves its own IMDb page, Proyas is here to able to give it a very original and refreshing spin. The plot kicks off like a hard boiled story from Raymond Chandler or Dashiel Hammett, a man with no identity caught up in a web of intrigue, but this ruse, when flipped on its head, proves to be both entertaining and also excellently handled, a surreal but great interpretation of the genre. In fact, Dark City serves to splice paranoid science-fiction and mythos with said noir thriller set up that, somehow, satisfies both criteria. The film can be viewed as a Lynchian like hour and half long lucid dream put on to film, an unconventional psychological thriller and also as an engrossing sci-fi trip.
Considering its restless pacing, the characters are rushed to our attention, though they are well played by an offbeat, suitably eccentric cast. Rufus Sewell, in a rare major leading role, brings burning intensity and traumatic identity confusion to John, although he often struggles with the rigours of maintaing a rough American accent. Meanwhile, Jennifer Connelly is alluring and innocent as supposed wife Emma, William Hurt provides weary savvy as the disillusioned cop, and Kiefer Sutherland goes off road with an against type and creepy rattish performance as the key to the truth, Dr Schreber (named for a real 19th century psychologist and esteemed writer who was himself committed). Ian Richardson is typically reliable as the stalkers' leader figure, while Richard O'Brien steals scenes as the unsettling and nebulous Mr Hand, who undergoes some radical personality changes after being imprinted with John's intended personality.
Stunning in its appearance, gloomy yet poetic, the city with no name is almost a character in itself, taking the trope 'Crapsack World' to a whole other level. Visually speaking, Dark City is an absolute feast, matching such iconic vistas as Blade Runner and Metropolis. While the film may not exactly provide moments to pause and reflect on the sights around us, the impressions left behind are highly memorable, and cinematography is just one of the main technical fields that the movie gets spot on. One of the biggest twists, arriving just before the climax, features a sequence which is positively jaw dropping.
To pack so much into a relatively modest running time is Proyas's greatest achievement here, managing to evoke various philosophical questions and musings while at the same time providing a breathless thrill ride that resolves itself logically, happily and existentially. One second it is able to examine the human condition, questioning what truly makes us who we are, before quickly taking a segue into chase scene action or quiet, contemplative drama. Not a single frame is wasted, quality over quantity, and the sheer energy behind the work is almost unbearable in its tension. Not since Terry Gilliam's Brazil has a film conjured such an overwhelming, heavy sense of madness and humourous despair. That this film did not act as a springboard for Proyas's career (his underwhelming resume since 1998 includes garbage such as I, Robot and Knowing) is perhaps a greater mystery than those presented in the film.
Hugely engrossing in its storytelling, with the kind of atmospherics and underlying tension that huge budgest simply cannot buy, Dark City takes surreal action to a whole other level, wrapped up in beyond our world significance and psychological study while positing as both a noir thriller and sci-fi horror. Starkly original, highly addictive and hugely memorable, it may not be proclaimed as one of the science fiction greats, but it truly deserves to be.
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