It's interesting how stories stick with you.
This one stuck with me for days.
The story is a classic noir setup. Gumshoe down on his luck meets a pretty brunette at his office, sleeps with her, wakes up to blood in his bed but no body, and gets visited by the brunette's blonde sister wielding a gun, wondering what happened to her sister. It gets messier from here, as is the norm with noir. In noir, the story was never simple, even if the sets were. The gumshoe Roland Drake is a Marlowe-esque character and you feel for him and his predicament. He's had a string of unfortunate things happen and while he has certainly retained his sarcasm, his failure to write his own happy ending makes him melancholy. He obviously still longs for that happy ending, which is why he falls hard for the blonde, despite having misgivings about the case and the blonde's weird family. There are some laughs and there is some violence and there's certainly drama, but in my mind this is ultimately a story of romance, albeit not a typical one. To me this is mostly a story of the gumshoe's struggle between his romanticism and the cynicism brought on by his experience. In the end, one must prevail. The struggle of romanticism vs cynicism is timeless and that's the part that always gets to me, and as a result I keep thinking back to this story and my empathy buttons keep getting pushed. There are some really loathsome characters in this story, and while they can't be excused, some of the villainous actions could be seen as reactionary, or at the very least inescapable. The parable of the frog and the scorpion comes to mind.
The acting was solid throughout. Some familiar faces as well, if not big names. Steve Tom got a lot of laughs from me (he's one of those guys I keep seeing everywhere). I haven't actually seen Vernon Wells in anything since The Road Warrior, despite his lengthy resume, but it was fun to see him gleefully chew up all the scenery, both real and virtual. Which brings me to the production values.
I knew going in that this was going to be a low budget indie so I knew I wasn't expecting The Avengers level production values. But what these guys pulled off on a shoestring budget and a tiny crew is pretty amazing. From what I've seen practically every scene in this film features a virtual set or set extensions of some kind. Which is understandable given the 1940s setting, but mind blowing given the small budget. I can't imagine it being easy to pull off a period piece where a large city like Los Angeles is the primary backdrop, without having tens of millions of dollars just for the production design and visual effects.
Is this a perfect film? Of course not. No film is. But it is entertaining and the story stuck with me. What more can I ask for?
The story is a classic noir setup. Gumshoe down on his luck meets a pretty brunette at his office, sleeps with her, wakes up to blood in his bed but no body, and gets visited by the brunette's blonde sister wielding a gun, wondering what happened to her sister. It gets messier from here, as is the norm with noir. In noir, the story was never simple, even if the sets were. The gumshoe Roland Drake is a Marlowe-esque character and you feel for him and his predicament. He's had a string of unfortunate things happen and while he has certainly retained his sarcasm, his failure to write his own happy ending makes him melancholy. He obviously still longs for that happy ending, which is why he falls hard for the blonde, despite having misgivings about the case and the blonde's weird family. There are some laughs and there is some violence and there's certainly drama, but in my mind this is ultimately a story of romance, albeit not a typical one. To me this is mostly a story of the gumshoe's struggle between his romanticism and the cynicism brought on by his experience. In the end, one must prevail. The struggle of romanticism vs cynicism is timeless and that's the part that always gets to me, and as a result I keep thinking back to this story and my empathy buttons keep getting pushed. There are some really loathsome characters in this story, and while they can't be excused, some of the villainous actions could be seen as reactionary, or at the very least inescapable. The parable of the frog and the scorpion comes to mind.
The acting was solid throughout. Some familiar faces as well, if not big names. Steve Tom got a lot of laughs from me (he's one of those guys I keep seeing everywhere). I haven't actually seen Vernon Wells in anything since The Road Warrior, despite his lengthy resume, but it was fun to see him gleefully chew up all the scenery, both real and virtual. Which brings me to the production values.
I knew going in that this was going to be a low budget indie so I knew I wasn't expecting The Avengers level production values. But what these guys pulled off on a shoestring budget and a tiny crew is pretty amazing. From what I've seen practically every scene in this film features a virtual set or set extensions of some kind. Which is understandable given the 1940s setting, but mind blowing given the small budget. I can't imagine it being easy to pull off a period piece where a large city like Los Angeles is the primary backdrop, without having tens of millions of dollars just for the production design and visual effects.
Is this a perfect film? Of course not. No film is. But it is entertaining and the story stuck with me. What more can I ask for?