blackdahlia

AC/N 2006 121m Eng 50m
SV/SL

CAST: Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart, Hillary Swank, Mia Kirshner, Mike Starr, Fiona Shaw & Bill Finley

CREDITS: Director: Brian De Palma; Screenwriter: Josh Friedman, based on the novel by James Ellroy; Producers: Art Linson/ Avi Lerner/Moshe Diamant/Rudy Cohen; Director of Photography: Vilmos Zsigmond; Production Designer: Dante Ferretti; Editor: Bill Pankow; Costume Designer: Jenny Beavan; Music: Mark Isham

THE SYNOPSIS

The year is 1946. The place is Los Angeles, California. Best buddies Dwight “Bucky” Bleichert (Hartnett) & Lee Blanchard (Eckhart) are former-boxers-turned LAPD Homicide Detectives who become the poster-boys for the depart-ment after their actions in the infamous “Zoot-Suit Riots” of 1946.

On January 15, 1947, the mutilated body of an actress named Elizabeth Short is discovered in a vacant lot. Betty (Kirshner) was known as The Black Dahlia (due to both her propensity for wearing black all of the time and as a play on her favorite movie The Blue Dahlia). The grisly crime becomes front-page news and the authorities place Bucky and Lee in charge of the investigation.

THE CRITIQUE

Straight-up: THE BLACK DAHLIA is a big disappointment from one of my favorite directors: Brian De Palma. The auteur--know for such classics as Carrie (1976), Scarface (1983), Body Double (1984), The Untouchables (1987), Mission: Impossible (1996) and a host of other fun films--tackles the infamous 1947 slaying with gusto, but misses the mark for some reason.

Part of the blame must lie with the screenplay writeen by

THE BOTTOM LINE

Outside the basis of a fascinating true-crime event, terrific production values & truly-handsome cinematography, this one bites. If you’re going to make a movie about the tragic Black Dahlia case, then make it your nexus--not an underdeveloped arc on the screenplay’s periphery. I was so mad when I walked out of the theater that I snuck into Hollywoodland and enjoyed that one a tad more.