Real Men Love Dark City

The Appropriate Name

You have to appreciate it when a movie lives up to its name.  I mean, it would be pretty disappointing to pop in a movie called Dark City and get nothing but sunshiney countryside.  That's why it's so lovely that the city is so dark.  And it's not just generally dark.  It's always dark.  The sun never shines.  It is never day time.  It is always night.  And it is only in the city.  The darkness, apart from making the title refreshingly accurate, also serves to deepen the mood and -- along with the way the characters speak and dress -- give the film a vaguely 1930s-ish vibe, and the detective story, led by William Hurt's Sam Spade-like character, only enriches the noir flavor.

The Visual Detail

Now, you don't know what's going on in the above picture if you haven't seen the movie (it's a bunch of Strangers altering personal effects to fit a new reality -- more on that in a bit), but reel to reel this is one of the most visually impressive films you will ever watch, and that is due in large part to director Alex Proyas' impressive attention to detail.  The man has got to have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, because every shot is perfectly consistent and seamless within the greater film. Visually, it's an unqualified masterpiece.

John, 614 

The messianic storyline has been exploited many times before Dark City (Star Wars, Dune, uh... The Bible) and many times since (The Matrix, Harry Potter), but apart from the Bible itself, none of them make any references as sly as the number on main character John Murdoch's hotel room... the hotel he awakens nude in with no memories (he's reborn... get it?).  That number is 614.  As in, John 6:14.  As in, the bible verse wherein the people recognize the coming of a great prophet that was foretold.  Sure, the other tales all have their own little internal prophecies.  But Dark City doesn't have that.  It just hides a few references to one of the oldest examples of the genre and lets the story stand on its own.  And it works.  You don't have to catch the references to enjoy the movie, but it's a nice little easter egg for obsessive freaks like myself.

Kiefer Sutherland as the Creepy Mad-Scientist Traitor to His Species (Who Seeks Redemption)

The longer Kiefer plays Jack Bauer, the easier it is to forget that he had previously carved a long and successful career out of playing mostly creeps and assholes.  Remember Stand by Me, The Lost Boys, Freeway and A Time to Kill?  Well, Dark City's Dr. Schreber has them all topped in a few key categories of creepdom.  For one, he's a stooge for one of the creepier races ever captured on celluloid, The Strangers (I promise, they're coming up).  He also has only one normal eye and one horribly mangled one, which injury always accounts for a few points in the overall creep score, and he speaks as if he's got the lung capacity of a wasp.  He seems to be able to force out only two or three words at a time before gasping for breath.  This results in a halting style that, while annoying, actually adds to the suspense, as he's the character who's most willing to share information in a universe wherein everyone either knows nothing or is actively hiding what they know.

Jennifer Connelly:  Lounge Singer

Jennifer Connelly is a lounge singer.  I like that.

The Strangers

I told you I'd get to them.  The Strangers are an alien race from another solar system who came to earth seeking the means of their own survival, and believe these means to be related to understanding the human soul, which they as hive-minders do not possess.  They look like death incarnate or some sort of trench-coated evil team of Powders (from Powder).  To accomplish their goals, they conduct experiments on us which involve switching all of our memories around along with the related environments, hoping to glean some knowledge about what makes individuals individual.  Oh, and their bodies are simply the inhabited bodies of our dead.  They are bald, almost translucent white and diabolically creepy...

Especially the One Child Stranger

Jesus Christ, that's creepy.  Don't bite knuckles, baby Stranger.  I think you just gave me a creepgasm.

Tuning

Tuning is the quintessential power of the Strangers, and it's unstoppable.  It is the power to reshape reality through thought.  Sound a little familiar?  Well, this movie came out before The Matrix, so check your baseless accusations at the door.  I'm not saying the Wachowski Bros. stole from this movie, either.  They probably just shared some common source... Dark City had a wide range of influences, and your beloved Matrix is no different.  I've gotten off track, though:  the ability to tune is also what makes John, our hero, special.  Humans aren't supposed to be able to do it, but John can.  Tuning manifests itself onscreen as a sort of semi-visible waves in the air, kind of like the heat distortion you see above a hot grill, but in focused rings.  And you can use it for anything.  But I guess it's no Kung Fu or flying.  Sorry, Neo.

"Sleep."

Part of the tuning ability for Strangers involves the fairly hilarious skill of waving their hand over someone's face while saying, "Sleep."  This, of course, causes the subject to sleep, generally resulting in the person slumping over, slamming their face on their desk, etc.  It's basically a Jedi Mind Trick.  But there's one scene in particular where the Strangers get a little carried away:  seeking John inside a police station, the Strangers cause every police officer they see to sleep in this manner... individually.  It still makes me chuckle every time.  Imagine if Obi Wan Kenobi had used the, "These aren't the droids you're looking for," schtick four additional times in that same scene.  That's sort of what it's like.  "These aren't the droids you're looking for, either.  These also aren't the droids you're looking for.  And you?  The droids you seek are in a different location altogether."

The Goodwins:  The Rags to Riches Couple

I mentioned that the Strangers switch around everyone's memories and identities, right?  I hope so.  At any rate, the above metamorphosis is the most memorable instance of that.  One moment, the man is hoping he'll get the night off.  The next, he's telling his wife about how he's going to have to fire the man who was just his boss.  It's a great shorthand for the entire process, and it's executed brilliantly.  By the way, when you're watching the tuning sequences, try to keep in mind that the operating budget of The Matrix was 65 million dollars, while the budget for Dark City was 27 million.  And I'm saying that not as an excuse, but because I think Dark City's effects are universally more impressive.  Bullet-time was cool, though.  I especially liked it in that Rolling Stones video.

Brain Needles Disturb Me

This is how you switch memories around.  Not pretty.  Pretty bad-ass, though. 

"Shut it down."

When it's time for the Strangers to change everything for the next phase of their experiment, their leader makes the call to "shut it down," which is more or less a cue for the audience to clench their sphincters so they aren't blown out by the ensuing special effects extravaganza.  When "it" gets "shut down," "it" is everything, and it is preceded by a giant face opening in the Strangers lair to reveal a giant clock, which stops.  When it stops, that's when you know that they've shut it down.  I like to cheer when it gets shut down.  You may feel free to do the same, but I do ask that you credit me for the idea.

The Philosophy

It's also very, very similar to The Matrix with a subtle difference.  While the central question of The Matrix is, "What does it mean to exist?" or, "What does it mean to live?" the central question of Dark City cuts a bit more directly to the heart of the matter:  "What does it mean to be human?"  As I said, it's subtle, but I think the distinction is important.  You can either exist or live and never be human.  Dark City asks the existence questions, but only in passing and as a means to reach the Big Deal. 

I have to give props to The Matrix for being a big budget action movie and daring to ask a Big Question, but it stops short in comparison to Dark City.  Now, there are some who'll say, "Doesn't The Matrix ask the humanity question with the way it presents artificial intelligence?"  And it does.  But the question there is not, "What is the essence of humanity," but the related-but-different, "Why do you assume robots don't have it?"  And, again, that's cool and all, but it's kind of a stylish skirting of the bigger issue.  Dark City tackles it head-on, and that's why Real Men Love Dark City. 

Oh, and the climactic battle is awesome, but I don't want to give that away...  have you ever seen Akira?  I've said too much.