The remarkable signature of ‘A Scanner Darkly’, achieved through Rotoscoping, a film tracing process imposed on live action video tape images, was first used by Linklater on ‘Waking Life’ in 2001.
The process has advanced with additional detailing that includes what really look like living eyes.
The results are startlingly real, yet unreal. We are watching hyper-sophisticated cartoons with eyes that mirror souls. Light years ahead of Bambi!
There is that unsettling floaty vibe from ‘Waking Life’ happening that renders life on their planet far more graceful than ours.
It’s Anaheim, California, seven years from now, and it’s a paranoid hellhole. A deeply addictive drug called D for Death has most of the populace in its grip. Eight of ten citizens are under surveillance in the government’s war on drugs and the remaining two are spying on them. Families and friends turn each other in, as protection against the threat of rehab and losing their beloved drug.
The spying and arrests are carried out by undercover officers who wear scramble suits that morph their appearance continuously with strangers’ faces and clothes, like chameleons on speed.
Rotoscoping is an ideal way to bring this genius disguise to the screen, it’s not merely an artistic conceit.
The spies wear the scramble suits to avoid being identified by drug addicts, but also by their colleagues. The cops don’t know what their partners look like and the bosses don’t know what the underlings look like. And no one trusts anyone else. Anonymity and paranoia go well together.
Keanu Reeves is Bob Arcter, codename Fred, assigned to spy on his roommates, played by Woody Harrelson and Robert Downey, Jr. He has to find out who supplies them with D.
The guys are typical movie slackers who have no work, crash on each other’s floors and imbibe rather than job hunt. Of course they’re on D.
Downey’s character, Barris, is an out of control troublemaker, obsessed with guns. He has a dark side, an attraction to death coupled with a sociopathic mindset that allows him to witness it and feel nothing. He delivers his quasi-intellectual, soulless credo in a constant high-speed drone that’s rather hypnotic. But it’s all nonsense. He thinks its genius because he’s on D.
Bob is reluctant to carry out the job because he doesn’t believe in the regime anymore. He’s beginning to realize that the war on drugs is sinister sanctioned oppression that forces citizens to relieve their anxiety with D. And he’s starting to feel the pressure, too.
It’s a bleak world separated into drug addicts and spies. Nothing good ever happens. Drugs are ravaging society on every level from the keepers of society to the lowest prisoner. There is less than no hope of escape.
It’s the familiar landscape created by cult hero, the late Philip K. Dick, the science fiction writer who dreamed up out-there books and graphic novels, among them "Blade Runner," "Total Recall" and """The Minority Report." They focus on futuristic societies in which individuals struggle to survive under threat of arrest and death.
The film is a meditation of the devastation of drugs and government ineptitude in handling the crisis. But there’s a weird tacked on tribute to real life drug casualties that seems ill-conceived.
The message is troubling – weep for the drug casualties, because disappointment with the world forces them into drugs. They are sick and dead because of the system. They are not to blame. D is the opiate of people disenfranchised by an uncaring government. As though no one has will or strength.
‘A Scanner Darkly’ is a fascinating film, artistically and in its subject matter, but it’s that crippling flaw. Graphic novelist Dick has no faith in the human spirit and fails to acknowledge goodness and wisdom common to all people.
A glimpse of humanity would make us care more about these poor people. But we’re only looking through a scanner darkly.
Limited USA rollout July 7th. MPAA Rated R for drug and sexual content, language and a brief violent image.
LordOfRuinJul 7th, 2006 - 11:27:37
Hi, the first rotoscoping I saw was on the original Lord Of The Rings animated film. As money was running out, rotoscoping became the cheap alternative, painting over cheap film of horsemen and the like. That was way back. A Scanner Darkly has upped the ante somewhat though. Quite frankly, I can't wait to see it. I like this sort of dirty grubby movie that oozes style.
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